Melody

AroView: An adorable yet forgotten youth movie that we discovered has a passionate cult following especially among those that were young and impressionable at the time of its release.

Based on the first script by Alan Parker before he directed “Bugsy Malone” and reuniting the pin-up child actors Jack Wild and Mark Lester from the Oscar-winning “Oliver!”, this has the same precocious energy of both films, with the kids lionized and the adults shamelessly satirized. The pair play school classmates who are divided by class but united by twelve-year-old mischief and fun, but all goes a bit squiffy when one of them falls desperately in love with ‘Melody’ (Tracy Hyde). With a soundtrack by The Bee Gees and a vividly-realised London setting this is one for Anglophiles and retro-romantics.

“Exquisitely directed by Waris Hussein, the picture has striking color photography that crisply squints at contemporary London and an anthill depiction of a public school like a precocious child, missing nothing.” ~The New York TImes