By Debbie Lyn Elias
According to Harry Brown actress Emily Mortimer, not a day goes by that you don’t “turn on the telly” or pick up a newspaper and “there’s always another story day after day of someone being stabbed….“The communities that [the gangs] are in don’t offer them [a sense of belonging and family] at all. They are really poverty stricken communities and everybody is living life under really difficult and often terrible circumstances. There’s an abundance of drugs and deprivation and there’s no comfort to be had.
Himself living during his college days at the edge of a housing estate in England director Daniel Barber is personally aware of the escalating violence and degradation of these communities, so much so that he himself was compelled to ask searching questions about the “collective responsibility that calls us to act before a whole generation is lost.”
And in answering those questions, Barber found Harry Brown.
Harry Brown is a former Marine and war veteran, now in his late 70s. Not one to speak about his days in the military, he prefers the solace of his small flat and a cup of tea. A quiet man, he lives in the high-rises of Elephant & Castle, which serve as a haven for gangs and drug lords. During the day, Harry visits his wife who lies in a vegetative state in a nursing facility. In late afternoons, he joins his only friend, Leonard, at the local pub for a game of chess. Perhaps the only bit of adventure in Harry’s day is the circuitous routes he takes to visit the hospital or meet Leonard, doing his best to avoid a pedestrian underpass at the Estate which is commandeered by the local gangs who spend their time intimidating and attacking young and old alike.
But when Harry’s wife passes away, his life takes on a different shape. Getting to the hospital too late thanks to his fear of the gangs Harry confides his loss and frustration to Leonard. Ironically, Leonard has his own problems and confides in Harry about his own issues with the gangs. Determined to stand up for himself despite warnings from Harry to just keep quiet and let the police handle it, Leonard is found stabbed to death in the underpass.
Soon the police come to Harry to seek answers surrounding Leonard’s death. Met by the compassionate yet businesslike D.I. Alice Frampton, Harry’s initial faith in the police and their investigative skills are put to the test as crime escalates and murderers continue to run loose. Frustrated and tired of sitting on the sidelines, Harry calls on his long buried past and brings his own brand of vigilante justice to the estate.
Like his character, Caine fought in Korea and grew up in the East End, actually living around the corner from where this movie was filmed. For Caine, Harry Brown “reads like a Western. Telling you exactly how it is. We are here because this is all so real. I understood the character absolutely and completely.”
Key to the story line are the gang members and for director Barber, authenticity was key. Auditioning literally hundreds of kids from the estate area, according to Mortimer, “a lot of the kids that were in the movie as extras, and even the kids that were the principal characters, the gang kids, come from that world. This isn’t unfamiliar territory to them and a lot of them had had experiences that weren’t completely dissimilar from the people they were playing in the movie.”
The film is so tightly and sharply directed by first-timer Daniel Barber that he held me rapt from fade-in to fade-out. I doubt if I even blinked. The editing and sound are both superb and Martin Ruhe’s cinematography is edgy and grainy – leaving me with a sense of needing a shower having just immersed myself in the dregs of British society. Harry Brown is a very powerful film, anchored by a superb performance from Michael Caine. Don’t miss it.
HARRY BROWN. Samuel Goldwyn Films. Rated R. 102 mins
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