This Is England

The sixth feature from British film-maker Shane Meadows (Dead Man's Shoes, TwentyFourSeven) offers a semi-autobiographical portrait of skinheads in the 1980s. Set in a bleak (and unnamed) northern town just after the Falklands War, the film follows 12-year-old Shaun (Thomas Turgoose) as he's befriended by a group of kindly, multiracial skinheads. A touchingly funny first half gives way to something more disturbing as Shaun is drawn to a breakaway group of National Front supporters led by Combo (Stephen Graham), a terrifying racist. Like much of Meadows's work, This Is England pivots on a relationship between a child and a disturbed father figure; this time, though, the dynamic writer/director has produced what could well be his masterpiece. Coaxing a superb performance from his young lead and brilliantly evoking the working-class despair of the Thatcher era, Meadows has created a film to be reckoned with.