Review of This Is England (2007) by Minna S — 13 Feb 2010

"See, the life I've had can make a good man bad", said Morrissey once and he says it again in the end of This is England through a cover of Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want (though it was released in 1986 when the movie takes place 3 years earlier but let's not be nitpickers).

Shaun is a young boy whose father has died, he is bullied at school and everything else goes downhill. He meets up with significantly older bunch of skinheads who welcome him to join their gang. And he does, they respect him and all. After some time, their friend gets out of prison and returns with a new ideology: national pride. Not racism but realism, of course. Not everyone buys it but Shaun does. To fight for his country would make his dad proud, he figures. And it begins.

The topic is not unheard of. There is always the need to explain how people can end up with so much hate and anger. Broken homes, bad experiences in relationships, need for a band of brothers, unability to express feelings. These are the core elements that lead people to extreme groups such as these so called nationalists, according to this movie. When you feel bad about yourself it is easy to hate others. But when it goes too far then also a 12-year-old boy realizes that this is not the right approach.

The film is a bit superficial. Sure, the nationalist speeches were unpleasant as is the thought of young children being exposed to such verbal excrement, but the people were merely onesided characters than real people in real life.