Rising up through the ranks with such gritty indies films as Twentyfourseven, A Room for Romeo Brass, Once Upon a Time in the Midlands, and Dead Man's Shoes, English filmmaker Shane Meadows has proven himself one of the most unique voices in contemporary British cinema. While at their core Meadows' films are always deeply personal, they also have a remarkable way of tapping into the collective conscience. Culled from actual events that took place in Meadows' youth, This Is England maintains an intrinsically autobiographical tone while offering a vivid portrayal of Thatcher-era England. From the nostalgia-tinged opening images of *Space Invaders, Simon Le Bon, Kit from Knight Rider, and the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Di, there's no mistaking precisely when and where the action is taking place. Just as efficiently as he clues the viewer in to the setting, Meadows lets us know what kind of story we're in for as 12-year-old Shaun gets out of bed, casts a melancholic glance at a photograph of his father, who was recently killed in the Falklands War, and gets hauled into the principal's office for assaulting a smart-mouthed rude boy for making a tasteless joke about his dad. The day hasn't started out too well for young Shaun, but by the time it's over he'll have been accepted into the fold by a jovial gang of skins, and headed down a road of newly discovered self-confidence and personal exploration. While the former part of that journey rings remarkably true and sincere during the opening act, it's the latter part that proves somewhat less satisfying as politics and proselytizing careen the film uncomfortably into message movie territory.
As a screenwriter, Meadows has a wonderful way of building relationships between characters and expressing the transformation of his protagonists. The scenes in which young Shaun cautiously lets down his guard as his mop is being buzzed and he proudly dons his first Ben Sherman work remarkably well, even when Meadows falls back on montage to keep the story moving along. Young actor Thomas Turgoose is endearingly naturalistic in his very first film role, and the scenes in which he endures the embarrassment of his mother scolding his new friends, charms an older Siouxsie and the Banshees fan, and confronts an intimidating and substantially larger racist skinhead prove him to be a pint-sized powerhouse with a promising future. With strong supporting turns by Joseph Gilgun as Shaun's substitute big brother Woody, Vicky McClure as Woody's Chelsea-coiffured girlfriend, Lol, and Stephen Graham's scalding performance as volatile, National Front recruiting ex-convict Combo, there's more than enough talent to keep the story afloat even as Shaun drifts away from Woody and the tone shifts from playful to portentous.
While it's easy to see why Shaun would buy into Combo's poisonous agenda given the manner in which the impressionable young boy is manipulated by the charismatic racist skin, the levity that Woody and company provided is sorely missed once playful games of back-alley soccer give way to ransacking of foreign-owned stores and harassing of minority youths. Of course, if you're making a film set in Thatcher-era England and detailing the exploits of the skins and punks who began to become an increasingly prominent aspect of that society, it's essential to showcase music that accurately reflects their lifestyle. In compiling an impressively diverse soundtrack featuring Toots & the Maytals, the Specials, and the UK Subs among others, Meadows proves highly successful at capturing that unmistakable moment in time. Often singled out as a social realist filmmaker who is at his best when drawing upon personal experience, Meadows has admittedly culled much of This Is England from his own youthful experiences; the result is an engaging coming-of-age story that favors genuineness over mawkishness while always remaining true to character and form.