Welcome back to the Randomizer!
You may remember over a month ago, I was thinking about
doing my favourite moments from This is England, instead I talked about
Halloween and its origins. So I’m going to do that now! Not just because it was
a great show, and having quite fond memories of it, but also it might have some
relevant themes that connect with the world now more so then ever. For now,
let’s talk about This is England, something Mibs Bayliss got me into, and I’m
very grateful for it.
This is England began over 9 years ago, released in cinemas
in 2006. It was at first the story of a boy called Shaun, who had lost his
father in the Falklands War, dealing with his emotions on that, and making
friends with a group of skinheads, the two biggest characters of the group Woody
and Milky. Hanging out with them gives Shaun a new lease on life, and even gets
himself a love interest, Smell. That’s her nickname, short for Michelle. Why
she’s called ‘Smell’ is a bit of a mystery, or maybe it isn’t? But I digress.
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| Maybe she likes camembert cheese? I don't know |
The biggest change in the group comes in the form of Combo,
a skinhead who had served a prison sentence, and has become a racist fighting
with a black man in prison. After he returns, Combo shares more racist views,
and Shaun, along with others, is swayed to join, wanting to make his dad proud.
Shaun sees Combo as a mentor figure, the latter promising he won’t let him
down. I’ll try not to go into spoilers for this series, but I think this will
make it inevitable, considering I will be talking about the more powerful
scenes in the series.
If you haven’t seen this film at all, I suggest you do so.
It is a really good film, acting is really good, the music used is really good,
more so with the piano played songs by the great Ludovico Einaudi, it will make
you laugh and cry, it is an emotional power house. In fact, why are you still
sitting there reading? Go to Amazon or to HMV, buy it! Simon says!
If you think the film was great, yet visceral, you should
see the three mini-series. Set in 86, 88, and 90, the series now effectively
follows Woody and Lol, in their various situations between family (oh boy…),
depression, and…so much more, it’s hard to think what I can say. Shaun is still
in there in the series, and gets a good deal of focus. It’ still sort of a
coming-of-age story, just like the film. It does continue the tone nicely,
having some great light-hearted moments, but also throws you into the dark
moments, slowly building up to the crescendo, and make you feel horrified. The
last series was shown over two months ago in September, and it’s likely to
never come back to our screens again, but it’s still a very powerful series,
and deserves utmost attention if you can find the time to watch it.
Thus we come to talking about my particular powerful moments
overall. These scenes will be significant, because they do invoke so much into
the drama of the present, and how the past still affects them deeply. Some of
these scenes, you will need to prepare yourselves for, and as I’ve said, there
will be spoilers. So if you don’t wish to know them, try to have a binge day of
watching this series beforehand. If you have watched this before, or don’t want
to bother watching, then let’s get to it.
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5 of my favourite moments:
1.
Shaun and Smell’s first kiss (This is England)
This is the scene that had me bursting out laughing first
time on hearing. Seriously, it starts off really sweet, and then swipes away
with one of the best lines in the film.
Shaun has been flirting with Smell for a while, and then one
night at a party, encouraged by Milky and Lol, asks Smell if she wants to go
out into the garden with him. They bond about how pretty Smell is, and then
they kiss each other for a moment, break, kiss again, Smell checking if he’s ok
every time, and she comes out with this beauty of a line: ‘Do you want to suck
my tits?’.
How can anyone not laugh at that, I don’t know. On first
watching that it did feel like it comes out of nowhere, it was probably the
first film I’ve seen that sort of breaks the tension after a passion lustful
kiss. In effect, that is what it is, it’s a lustful kiss. In building up to that,
we actually don’t learn so much about Smell through dialogue, it’s really
expressed through her character. In the costumes she wears, her expressions,
and the shots of them together talking with each other, separate from the
group. So that idea’s planted into our head somewhat, that these two are going
to be together.
In hindsight this might be a great move in exploring first
loves, because we actually don’t learn that much about Smell through the
series, it’s really through Shaun’s eyes, and we allow ourselves to be guided
watching the film and the series how their relationships folds out at the end. I
believe to a point as well, that because their relationship isn’t a focal point
so much in the series (except perhaps This is England 88), we get a good,
interesting idea in how they work as a couple, which I think putting the two
together, they mesh well to a point, but not enough.
It’s a great moment, that on reflection has deep underlying
tones to it.
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| Guess in years, judging by my hands, how long we last for? |
2.
A lingering shot (This is England 90)
A lingering shot? Well that sounds kind of boring doesn’t
it? Well not exactly, not if you understand the significance of it, as I’m sure
many of you will know.
In This is England 90, the episode Summer (I think, someone
please correct if I’m wrong, could be spring) has Lol, Woody, Lol’s mum and the
latter’s girlfriend on the sofas, and then going out to have a barbecue,
leaving us with a long lingering shot of the living room in daylight. Why is
shot so significant? Because it was the setting for a rape scene.
Back in This is England 86’s third episode, One of Lol’s
sister’s friends, Trev, came up to the house to see Kelly, only to find Mick,
Lol and Kelly’s father. She sits with him for a moment, the awkwardness rising
bit by bit, only to see Mick then attack Trev violently, and then proceed to
rape her. It’s a horrifying scene to witness, and perhaps for many women who
have suffered, realistic. I don’t wish to try and say the wrong thing, so I
apologise if I do say anything that may accidentally be misconstrued.
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| Never remain silent to rape... |
That kind of shot, a simple medium shot of a living room,
especially in a series like This is England, can just bring up so much in our
heads, and serves to show that despite what the future has in store, the past
is still there, significant in being unable to escape what happened. It kind of
show what This is England 90 is about overall: no matter what, the past is
there. To ignore it is to avoid yourself, if that makes sense. If that shot
wasn’t in there, the series wouldn’t make you think and feel as much. It’s
those kind of shots that can make or break a series, and that simple shot MAKES
the series.
3.
The Table Scene (This is England 90)
Where do I even start? Well, I had the third episode
recorded, but already I was reading on Facebook from friends about how
devastating that scene was. It had me wondering what happened in that scene
that was gut-wrenching to watch, and when I did, I was pretty shocked and
saddened to watch the drama unfold.
The scene showed Lol and Woody, Milky, Kelly, her friend
Trev, Lol and Kelly’s mum, Shaun, and Lol’s support worker, all
sitting around the table after Sunday dinner. Lol has chosen that point in
time, to tell the truth of what happened to Mick. The story told was that Mick
was killed by Combo’s hand, and Combo is due to be released from prison. The
truth comes out, as was in seen in This is England 86, that after Trev was
raped, Lol took matters into her own hands, and killed Mick with a hammer as he
tried to rape her, Combo taking the fall, and coming to stay with Lol and Woody
for the moment.
From there, everything goes up. Milky understandably pissed
that Combo is coming to live with them, after what he did to him near the end
of This is England, beating Milky into a coma, and not allowing his daughter
Lisa to live under the same roof as the man. Kelly is pissed as well, because
the truth had been kept from her, believing both Lol and Trev to be liars, and
Mick to have been a good man, as seen by a photo of her dad in her wallet (I
think from the second or first episode, not sure). To nitpick just for one
moment, I believed that Lol had already told Kelly the truth back at the end of
86, but obviously I was wrong.
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| As well as believing this for all my life.... |
That scene was just emotional and brutal to watch, because it
was close to home from all that has happened so far. You understand both sets
of reaction to Lol’s confession, very credible though also ambigious as well.
Kelly’s feeling of being betrayed, for lack of a better word, is
understandable, because it’s her best friend and sister trying to protect her
from something horrible, allowing her to believe a lie for four years. Chanel
Cresswell playing Kelly really hit the reaction well, making the uncomfortable
levels rise to outright fury, because of what Lol and Trev did out of the love for
her. Milky’s reaction too is understandable, having lived with that attack for
most of the series, furious how Woody and Lol would even consider taking Combo
in, and Woody trying to explain that forgiveness was under-rated, but Milky was
having none of it.
It’s that point that sets up how the rest of the series
goes, and it delivers on those consequences brilliantly, even set up from the
film so long ago. We see Milky later on planning his revenge against Combo, and
Kelly falling deeper to using drugs, most prominently heroin, while staying at
two friend’s house, Harvey and Gadget. Yes, that is his name. His parents were
very cruel, but that’s not the point. It’s a scene that’s acted well, the
tension risen brilliantly, and the drama executed perfectly. It’s one of many
perfect scenes in the whole series.
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| Let's see America do better at this scene... |
4.
Shaun and Smell reunite (This Is England 86)
I will admit, I had watched This is England 86’s first
episode before I saw the film, but I didn’t watch the entire series until I got
it on DVD. I thought it was good on first viewing. It was interesting to watch,
seeing the characters for the first time on-screen, and surprised to see blood
in the back of Combo’s car at the beginning. But one thing that had stood out
for me at that time, was Shaun and Smell seeing each other for the first time
since what happened when Combo had beat up Milky.
When Shaun is injured by a bully, he’s taken to hospital to
be checked up, at the same time as Smell and the others are in hospital,
because one of the group had a heart attack. Shaun tells her he feels guilty
about what happened between Combo and Milky, but Smell tells him it wasn’t, and
gives him a kiss on the cheek before leaving, saying she’s missed him, really, before
leaving, Shaun saying he’s missed her too.
First time on watching, it probably was quite sweet. Now
seeing it again, it’s still a really sweet scene because it shows how deeply
they still love each other, even after three years of not seeing each other.
Even if I still don’t know much about Smell by word, I still see that
underlying affection there, though I will admit it’s interesting to watch
without knowing a thing about her, when I’m thinking about first loves being
there. It’s a strange conundrum. What I note as well, is that it’s the start as
well of Shaun getting back together with the gang, as a backward introduction
dissimilar to the film, but still allowing the audience to understand what
happened to a point in the past, and still appreciate how Shaun comes back to
the group.
I count it as among my favourite scenes because it’s deliberately
caring, and poignant between two people who still clearly care for one another,
but perhaps to a point as well ambiguous not because it’s not clear they’ll get
back together or anything, but because of how believable their love really is,
because of what we know about the characters themselves, and how they know each
other. As perhaps is a really subtle way of never knowing who is genuine in the
series. I might be going down deep into the rabbit too far, but there could be something
behind it, and I’m not just talking about the red pill.
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| What if I told you...that it was not your fault, and that the line 'What if I told you', was never used, and I have the power to see the future, and you're reading this in Lawerance Fishbourne's voice? |
5.
The last conversation in the series (This is
England 90)
Right before the end of the final ever episode of the
series, we see Lol and Woody finally getting married without a hitch, Shaun and
Smell having a quick conversation with each other, and Lol conforting Milky
about what happened to Combo when he met him for a ‘cuppa’. All of them brought
the series almost entirely full-circle, except for one thing.
Kelly comes to the wedding, and almost leaves not without
leaving a card behind, but is caught by Lol and they have a very deep
conversation about missing each other, Lol apologising for not talking with her
one on one, and Kelly telling that she has given up the heroin. With a final
embrace, Kelly is ready to join in the wedding reception, and Lol takes her in.
That scene, and I’m going to get a little soppy here, just
made me think of my brother on first viewing. Not to the extent of actuality, I
don’t do heroin. Much. But it just made me think about how much my brother
cares for me, and how I do care for him too despite being a dick beating me at
FIFA 16. Should have a fair play rule, but that’s not the point. On viewing
again after over a month, it’s a fantastic scene to behold.
It’s simply beautiful acting to take in and watch, the
emotions are pretty spot on, and it’s just so believable. If there was any
reason to watch the series from the start to the end, THIS is a bloody good
reason to. That one final bit of characterisation between those two siblings is
great because it shows, more for Kelly, how they in the ground for the moment,
but they are willing to come back, especially for Kelly. She’s been through
hell, and after a little bit of time sitting down to talk and getting away from
her dark place, she is ready to face the world head on. For Lol, it’s euphoric
to see Kelly safe, and sorry for her part in putting Kelly accidentally in her
place, but it does not diminish her love, and in the end embraces her.
It’s a beautiful scene to behold, seeing how much these two
have suffered in their different ways, coming together as the closest of best
friends. Well, as long as FIFA 16 isn’t involved.
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That’s really it for this week. There’s so much more I can
go into talking about more scenes in This is England, but perhaps this was
enough time to talk, and enough time for you to watch the series itself. I’m
not going to lie, it is a very ‘in-your-face’ drama series, but the way it’s
done is perfect because you understand what these characters are going through,
and it doesn’t feel contrived. That’s the best thing, it’s not drama for drama’s
sake. It’s drama for driven characters, touching on very relatable themes.
I would say definitely watch this series if you have a
chance. It might be a whole day, and a little bit of the next day, but it’s
worth it, and you’ll see for yourself why these scenes are powerful in their
own right, and see some of your own favourite scenes during viewing. No more to
say except…This Is England.
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| It will be missed... |
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That’s it for this week. Next time, the continuing story of
Hoppy in the Trenches from last year.
See you soon!
