Nil by Mouth

source: Nil by Mouth

I was looking forward to seeing this movie since the review last year by Siskel and Ebert was a big thumbs up. I also was looking for something different by Gary Oldman. However last night I tried, with my wife, as hard as we could to enjoy the movie but we just could not understand all the mumbling between the characters during the first 20 minutes so we gave up on it. This is a disappointment as I am sure that this was a good movie if only they spoke so we could understand them.

Kathy Burke portrays the battered wife extremely well - taking it as part and parcel of being an east-end wide-boy's other half. It is inenvitable that she will go back to him (Ray Winstone) after her severe beating as that's the life she knows and as she holds traditional family views of marriage she wants her child to be raised by a mother and a father. She believes in love. The extended family plays a major role in supporting her, her mother (Leila Morse) is a hardened woman but with a heart. They are not shocked by the going-ons of the destruction caused by alcohol and drug addition. They just get on with it and this is a powerful message that with family, love and support, you can conquer any mountain. People see it as a depressing and disturbing film but the final gestures and actions of all the characters suggest otherwise. Gary Oldman has done a great job in directing this film and it was brave of him and his sister to tackle a very difficult subject which has obviously affected their lives so deeply.

This is a piece of debutant film making at its best. Oldman set about to create a gritty and colourful portrayal of the rough end of life in Saafff Lhaandan and in that respect he was f**kin sucessfull you bunch ah chaaaants! The camera work is disjointed and initially appears clumsy, but the expertly chosen angles and focuses soon become enthralling. It is nicely gritty and rough around the edges. Take a special note of the excellent sound design - it really adds to the overall atmosphere of the cityscape Olman so expertly creates. The narrative progression is pretty much non-existent. Like all realist films its not really about what is happening, but the broader issues exposed by smaller events within the film. These include some brutal moments from Winstone and also some heavy drinking/clubbing binges. The acting is so good and so believable that I forgot I was watching a film - it is almost a documentary and those not familiar with the actors within the film may be fooled into thinking that is what they were watching. Olman also introduces some subtle symbolism (the moment with the red balloon for example) but is never heavy handed or distracting. Winstone and Burke really are stunning in this film, and the ending is a brilliant piece of ambiguity and hope. CHeck out Winstone's subtle touching moments with his daughter - it brings a tear to the eye. Classic in the modern sense of the word.

This is hellish domestic drama from director/writer Gary Oldman. It feels real because, for him, it was real, it was his life growing up in South London. Ray Winstone as the abusive Ray is amazing, as is Kathy Burke as Ray's wife and full time punching bag Valerie. Oldman employs a rough and ready style and gives the actors lots of room to move and react within the frame. The result is an incendiary experience, a film that leaves you gasping for fresh air and in awe of the superb performances, sharp cutting, great sound design and unapologetic subject matter. It doesn't angle for simple solutions to its powerhouse issues and isn't all misery, either. It's about strength and the the power of personal responsibility. Superb.

I WAS (allegorically) the Lil girl on the stairs watching it all, this film had me in tears literally, if you have been lucky enough NOT to have lived through this kind of abuse, rock on, but for those of us who have been there this is a shockingly accurate depiction, I cried all the way through (I used to have every Monday off school to get a new set of false teeth for my mother). This film is so close to the heart it is unbelievable, and I am only padding this out to make the minimum review length why should i need 10 lines of text why should i need 10 lines of textwhy should i need 10 lines of textwhy should i need 10 lines of textwhy should i need 10 lines of textwhy should i need 10 lines of text

The words "gritty", "British" and "drama" usually and rightfully condemn a film to the Guy "Windsor" Ritchie hall of excrement . Having seen these terms applied to Oscar contenders like "Goodbye Charlie Bright", "Rancid aluminium" and "Love, honour and obey", I wasn't really expecting much from this film. Saying I was wrong would be a huge understatement. "Nil by Mouth" is an awesome achievement. A razor sharp dissection of a working class south London family that delivers the required punch on so many levels that you need to have a wash after watching it. It covers a vast spectrum of emotions that will see you (especially if you're British) laugh, cry and more often than not, hold your head in despair at witnessing an all too true account of what it is to be at the bottom of the British class system. It is unflinchingly brutal and somewhat depressing, yet at the same time shows how with guts, determination and a healthy sense of humour, people can survive even the most bleak and hopeless of situations. Kathy Burke is outstanding and Ray Winstone is dependable as ever, but Gary Oldman's screenplay and direction are the stars of the show. This script could stand on it's own as a fine social commentary on par, and not dissimilar from John King's "The Football Factory" and "Headhunters". Thankfully Oldman has also realised that in terms of direction, "gritty" does not have to mean the static, cold and quite frankly boring as hell style that so many British films have. The camera moves with a documentary feel energy, yet the slick cinematography keeps it from ever looking cheap. Quite simply one of the greatest British films of all time. 9/10

I hated this movie. It's about a low class family in England where the norm is to get drunk, do drugs, beat your wife, etc. We see enough of this on the news so no need to waste 2 hours to watch insane, self destructive people abuse each other. The cinematography is horrendous & spotty, moving all over the place, out of focus & just hard to follow. Sorry, Gary but this movie wasted 2 hours of my time that I can't get back. If this was the way you were brought up, I pity you but then again you made it out of that hell hole. BTW, there's more cursing than not which makes the film lose the true effect of using those words. Pass on this movie...

There is a simple, nebulous concept at the heart of "Nil by Mouth": people who consume all manner of things (drugs (incl. booze) and those around them are the primary examples) but who spout nothing but rubbish. This is done more ambitiously (if more vaguely) during the film's first half: the sound is mixed so that conversations are only semi-intelligible, punchlines to jokes are cut off. Later on, this is made more explicit -- particularly in the form of a story which literally gives us the film's title. But this concept is all there is, aside from a rather lame tie-in to this being a/the root of domestic violence. Oldman dedicates this film to his father (ironically or sardonically, I hope), and I think this explains the mish-mash: this film is a sort of catharsis, an attempt to account for his upbringing. It's not bad art, but I hope he had more success with it as therapy.

STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning Ray (Ray Winstone) has a criminal past, has had problems with alcohol and is now forming a drug habit that is making him paranoid and prone to domestic violence to his wife Valerie (Kathy Burke) who tries to hold the family together but ends up coming off more like a doormat. Meanwhile, her mother Janet (Laila Morse) is aware of Ray's son, Billy (Charlie Creed-Miles) and his escalating drug habit that is sending him off the rails. The film follows these despairable characters as they tredge along with their lives. It is said that the British seem to enjoy being miserable, and that would include watching films that entertain them this way. Films like Nil by Mouth highlight this. It's a tale of a broken family, torn apart by crime, poverty, booze and drugs, the kind Jeremy Kyle would lap up like a three course meal. It is also essentially a tale of self destructive men, three generations apart and each copying the other, tearing a family apart and women trying to hold it together, despite not being strong enough. If you pick up a little of what it's about from the off-set, you can see it doesn't promise to be cheerful viewing from the start and it certainly doesn't disappoint in this. It's true what everyone said about the performances, and the lead stars, Winstone and Burke, do deliver some great acting. We see Winstone lose it with his wife, beating her senseless after some more coke induced paranoia, breaking down during a phone conversation with her and unleashing a typical arsenal of f and c words when she refuses to let him see his kid. Likewise, in a private moment, we see Burke skillfully lose her composure on a staircase, the full impact of the night before kicking in. This is another of those films where there's no 'plot' to follow, as such, just a real life feel of these hopeless lives carrying on from one day to the next. It's been acclaimed by many (including the Baftas!) but it really was just too grim and bleak for me. I have no right to criticize it for this, knowing what I knew about it from the off-set, but sadly this is how I found it. **