Lawless Heart

Missed this film the first time round at the Local Independent Cinema (The Belmont, Aberdeen). So glad to see it come back. I could easily have gone back in and watched this film again. Hats off to the film makers, they got things spot on. I cannot find the right words to say, great just does not cover it all. The cast were great, I could not fault a single performance. Nice touch at the end with the film projector being fixed by Tim, poor Dan trying all the way through and just not fixing it. It allowed Stuart to be shown in all his 'glory'.

There may have been other films that adopted this narrative structure, playing the same events over thrice, but from different points of view, but I've not seen such a film until Lawless Heart. I was blown away by both the idea and the execution of this structure, and I applaud the screenwriters/directors. A terrific cast of British actors including Bill Nighy get to strut their considerable acting stuff here. As the scenes are replayed each time, in each of the three acts, we gain more and more insight into each character. We are reminded that the events we live--you and I, in our quotidian lives--have many different protagonists, and we might be nothing more than a bit player to everyone else who experiences the same events, that we might be misinterpreting everyone else's motivation, and that the most interesting details may well be hidden from us. This may make the movie sound confusing, but it is not. The plot unfolds clearly and coherently. While I, a woman, enjoyed it, this is a men's movie, I think, for men who think and feel deeply, rather than men who like to see things blown up. You leave the theater or turn off your DVD player thinking, perhaps even a deeper person--and how often does that happen with a movie?

a film about the truth of life - at first I thought it was boring because I am so conditioned by Hollywood etc. even British films that have wowed in the past five years are shown to have a certain fakeness by this one. Enjoy. I think it would make my perfect date movie.

Bill Nighy said that "I know how not to make my eyes wiggle about"... and he demonstrates his, straight faced, lost older man, skills in this film. Brilliant, the way he conducts a conversation with Tom Hollander in the pub, but really to himself, about "courage" in love. All done with minimum face expression. Douglas Henshall, who plays a totally convincing, with great hair, wild at heart, prodigal son returning to the Essex village after 8 years travelling, is asked "Where's your hippie necklace" (sub text... so all that hippie stuff was just a passing phase, and now you've grown up). Henshall pulls out his hidden necklace from behind a loosened tie, and replies "Round my hippie neck". Henshall is never so convincing in this part as when he returns drunk at 3am to Tom Holander's house, where he has been lent a bed. While his companion gets down to rolling one, he puts on some music, much too loud. This wakes up Tom Hollander, who says it just isn't working out and asks him to leave. "But its 3am" he complains, and puts on one of the most exquisite expressions ever seen in the cinema, drunk but not so drunk that he can't attempt to placate, and be rational with Hollander. There are Rashomon quotes in the trivia (the home movie filmed into the sun), as well as the obvious parallels in the story line structure. The scarf keeps popping up, rather like the Rashomon book in Gost Dog. I love this film. There are scenes that will stay with you for life, but I will spare you my list, and simply say, watch it, again.

"Lawless Heart" is a quaint little British musing and reflection on the ebb and flow of affection among a variegated ensemble of characters just trying to make it from the womb to the tomb like you and me. Set in a village on the Isle of Man, this easy going dramedy mixes charm and heart with spritzes of passion and angst as it takes us on a carousel ride through the lives and loves of the characters showing us the same situations three times, each from a different person's perspective, thereby imparting a strong sense of interconnectedness. Enjoyable stuff worth a look by adults in the mood for an intelligently crafted story about people like us. (B)

A thoughtful, eloquent and compelling story of smalltown people wrestling with big time problems. This is a truly engaging movie - somehow realist and magical at the same time, that shows that British films don't have to feature Hugh Grant or crass cockney stereotypes. The dialogue is sharp, the acting competent if a little measured at times and you find yourself caring about how things will turn out even for characters you don't actually like that much.. I'm a friend of one of the directors in case anyone shouts bias, but I genuinely liked this movie and I'd recommend giving it a try.

This movie tells the same story from the viewpoint of three different people. The stories are presented in sequence and cover the same time span - the three characters are together in the first scene as well as several days later in the final scene. The event that brings them together in the first scene is the funeral reception for a man who was the brother-in-law of Dan (Bill Nighy), the lover of Nick (Tom Hollander), and the cousin and friend of Tim (Douglas Henshall). The plot structure is clever and works well. One of the challenges in telling a story in this manner that is effectively dealt with is to strike a balance in how much the characters interact - too little and the movie becomes three separate stories; too much and all the characters, as well as the viewers, know the whole story and there are no surprises. This plot structure is distinctly different from those of "Rashomon," where each character relates the same story with personal embellishments, or "Pulp Fiction," where the stories are only loosely intersecting and the time sequencing is not linear, or movies like "Lantana," which effectively utilizes flashbacks and interactions in real time among an ensemble of unrelated characters. With each succeeding scene in each story we fill in pieces of the puzzle. The curious way people behave in one story is understood in a later story. For example, when Tim throws a party and invites a woman with whom he has just been enamored, she shows up only to hide behind a wall and ultimately escape the party by climbing over a fence. Tim is hard pressed to interpret this peculiar behavior and Dan, who witnesses the escape from outside the house, is mystified. How odd we think, but later we learn that a recent ex-lover of hers is there and she does not want an encounter with him. We are made to think about how each of us sees only a small piece of the big picture. Each personal human encounter is the intersection of two worlds, the complex histories of which are fully known only by the individuals. People behave in ways that we find difficult to comprehend, but, in almost all situations, if we were to know the personal motivations and the full story, all would be understood. To a great extent, the dialog carries the movie. When Dan is approached by an interested woman, Corrine, at the funeral reception and she asks him if he is depressed, he says, "How would I know?" While the movie hangs together on first viewing, I found a second viewing to be rewarding. You pick up on a lot of things that would easily be missed on first viewing, like when Corrine invites Dan to dinner while checking out at the grocery store the cashier is a woman with whom Nick becomes involved. The acting is polished and the multitude of songs on the soundtrack seem to have been chosen with care and they augment the story. It was uncharitable not to credit the Schubert piano trio that so effectively set the mood at the beginning and the end (Trio in E flat, Op. 100 D.929). Altogether an engaging and skillful piece of film-making.

Sensitive, atmospheric piece, which feels very French (Rohmer an obvious influence) in its treatment of life, love and loss. Beautifully shot and acted. It's a quibble, but I wish that one of three stories could have been told from the point of view of one of the three principal women. I guess the male directors/writers might have felt unsure about it, or maybe it never even occured to them to try it. Whatever the reason, the result seems to me that the women are more enigmatic than the men, less developed, more like figures than characters. Having said that, it's an excellent work, well worth seeing.

Of all the films I watched at the London Film Festival, this one stood out head and shoulders above the rest. Bill Nighy's opening performance had me mesmerised for the first twenty minutes, and the film maintained these high standards throughout. The cinematography is superb, as are all of the performances from a very skilled and believable cast. The intertwined storylines reminded me of Kieslowski's Three Colours Trilogy, where everything comes together right at the end. So much for the poor state of the British film industry, watch this and have your faith restored - a wonderful film in every aspect!

In the funeral of Stuart, his sister Judy (Ellie Haddington) defends to her husband Dan (Bill Nighy) that his money should be delivered to his mate, the gay restaurateur Nick (Tom Hollander) since there is no will but that should be the wish if his brother-in-law. The faithful Dan meets the Frenchwoman Corrine (Clémentine Célarié) and he has the feeling that part of his life was lost. Meanwhile the grieving Nick hosts Stuart's best friend, the former hippie Tim (Douglas Henshall) at home. Tim has a crush on the worker of a fashion store Leah (Josephine Butler), who is heartbroken and healing from her last love affair, and he decides to give a party for her at Nick's place. After the party, Dan never meets Corrine in respect to his wife and but the drunken Michelle (Sally Hurst) gives a BJ on him; Nick befriends Charlie (Sukie Smith) that falls in love for him; and Tim finds that Leah's secret love is his stepbrother David (Stuart Laing). After a complicated beginning due to the great number of characters, "Lawless Heart" becomes interesting with the entwined lives of several lead characters and the same story is retold centered in Dan, Nick and Tim and filling the blanks. The less interesting segment is the ironical situation of Dan, where the British dark humor prevails in a questionable sense of fidelity. In the end, the screenplay with open end works reasonably well developing the realistic characters and situations and the result is a good low-budget movie supported by great performances. My vote is six. Titile (Brazil): "Coração Sem Lei" ("Lawless Heart")