This Is England

AroView: Utterly authentic, hard-hitting memoir from the dir. of A ROOM FOR ROMEO BRASS, about a boy’s coming-of-age as a skinhead during Thatcher’s England in the 1980s.

Near perfect as a time capsule of subculture and political unrest (the Falklands War its point of contention), Meadows’ film admirably engages in preconceptions – that all skinheads are racists – through a lively ska and reggae soundtrack, along with the introduction of an endearing clique of characters (one, of Jamaican descent) who adopt the uniform as a style rather than a statement. Charged with a familiar volatility – the introduction of a psychotic white nationalist (Stephen Graham) shifts the film tonally as its midpoint – this is also especially compelling for Turgoose’s naturalistic performance as the impressionable young lad indoctrinated into skinhead ranks.