Ruptured family ties and small town racist feuds come to a head in the English North West for music video director Daniel Wolff's visceral, startling feature debut.
We meet Laila and Aaron. Two young star crossed lovers in a grim rural town. They sit around smoking joints- as do pretty much everyone else in town- as there's not much better to do. They're reckless and bored but find an innocence and contentment in each others' company. The two keep to themselves in a run down caravan but as one is white and the other Pakistani, the local hoods from both sides seem to have other ideas. Taking place over the course of roughly one day, the film follows its two young leads as they are tracked on one side by a looming drug dealer and his older sidekick and on the other by Laila's father's goons.
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Wolff and cinematographer Robbie Ryan (fresh from his celebrated work on Philomena) do a tremendous job of setting up their colloquial scene, making no attempt whatsoever to articulate the local's thick drawl. Critics this week have been saying how the enjoyment of Mr. Turner, with all its Dickensian language, might be somehow lessened for those without English as their spoken tongue. Of course this is the case with any film language to some extent, but the thickness of the lilt here feels like a character all its own. As well as that, the town itself looks like something from a bad Romain Gavras camper-van holiday- all hot drinkable Bovril, flickering synthetic fireplaces and dive bars humming with slot machine glow. It's horrible, it's bitter cold, and you feel it to the bone.
Like many of the artists who seem to have a mark on this film- Glazer, Corbijn, Gavras et al- Wolff comes from the well trodden path of music video to feature director. He gave jake gyllenhaal that bizarre role in The Shoes' Time to Dance last year and with Catch me Daddy, he offers an assured first stab at the big screen. The final act veers rather drastically off course, like chasing that last buzz when you know it's time to go home, but still we left the 8:30 screening like some droogs from an early house; dazzled, wide eyed and buzzing for more.
