This Is England (2006)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Drama	Main Menu Audio & Animation Audio Commentary-Shane Meadows, Mark Herbert and Thomas Turgoose Interviews-Crew-BFI Interview with Shane Meadows Interviews-Crew-Mark Herbert (Producer) Interviews-Crew-Production Designer, Mark Leese Interviews-Cast & Crew-Hair, Makeup and Costume Featurette-Behind The Scenes-A behind-the-scenes look at four key scenes Deleted Scenes-Seven deleted scenes Teaser Trailer-Madman Propaganda
Rating
Year Of Production	2006
Running Time	98:01
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Shane Meadows
Studio Distributor	Madman Entertainment	Starring	Thomas Turgoose Stephen Graham Jo Hartley Andrew Shim Vicky McClure Joseph Gilgun Andrew Ellis Perry Benson George Newton Frank Harper Jack O'Connell Kriss Dosanjh Kieran Hardcastle
Case	Amaray-Transparent-S/C-Dual
RPI	$29.95	Music	Ludovico Einaudi

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Unknown	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Of the current generation of British filmmakers, Shane Meadows is without a doubt one of the most provocative and forthright. His films can be gut-wrenching experiences, but they can also challenge an audience on an emotional level; anyone who has seen his 2004 film, Dead Man's Shoes, can testify to this.

    This Is England is a very personal film for Meadows. Much of the story is based on his own association with skinhead gangs in the early eighties. An incredible degree of authenticity has been achieved not only through excellent production design, makeup and costumes, but also the clever use of stock footage and music from the period.

    The film opens with a montage of stock footage relating to the Thatcher era and in particular, the war in the Falklands. This immediately sets the mood for the film and establishes an atmosphere of conflict and uncertainty.

    Twelve-year-old Shaun (Thomas Turgoose) lives with his mother, Cynthia (Jo Hartley), in the Midlands of England. Shaun is trying to deal with the tragic death of his father in the Falklands war, while enduring the constant torments of school bullies. After a somewhat eventful last day of term, Shaun is walking home alone when he encounters a small group of skinheads. The group's leader, Woody (Joe Gilgun), takes an immediate shine to Shaun and offers to help him out with his school bully problem.

     In time, Shaun meets the larger group and because of his young age, becomes a very popular member. The group provides him with the fatherly guidance and security that he craves, however Cynthia has something to say when Shaun arrives home two hours late with his head shaved. In a wonderful scene, she courageously confronts the gang at a local café and lays down some ground rules.

    The contentment of the group is suddenly interrupted by the return of Combo (Stephen Graham) after a three and a half year stint in prison. Combo took the wrap for Woody years before, and immediately resumes a commanding role within the gang, but his time in prison has also realigned his social and political stance. Combo lectures the group on what he hopes will be their next phase, following the radical principals of the National Front movement. However, his desire to have everyone involved in this racial hatred ends up splitting the group. Woody and others opt to stay with their current carefree lifestyle and leave Combo to form his own band of brothers. Young Shaun chooses the radical path after Combo instills in him a sense of misplaced patriotism.

    Combo sees great promise in Shaun and treats him as a son, offering him his undying support and loyalty. As the nurturing of racial hatred continues, Shaun is unexpectedly confronted with a situation that seriously questions the moral issue of living this divisive and violent lifestyle. At his young age, Shaun takes a mature assessment of his life and of those who seek to nurture him.

    This Is England is widely regarded as Shane Meadow's best film to date, and with good reason. Performances from the entire cast are first rate, especially Stephen Graham and Thomas Turgoose, who in his first film role, is something of a revelation. Shane Meadows dedicated this film to the memory of Sharon Turgoose (Thomas' mother), who passed away in 2005.

Video

    The film is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1, which is 16x9 enhanced. The correct aspect ratio for This Is England is 1.85:1.

    The video transfer is excellent and doesn't present with any significant issues. The transfer displays a very good degree of sharpness and clarity. Apart from the stock footage, which has a totally different texture, the film occasionally exhibited a slightly soft appearance, which is almost certainly consistent with the original source material. Blacks were clean and shadow detail was of a high standard.

    Plenty of vibrant colours are used in the film. They appeared nicely balanced and natural, with no over-saturation issues.

    There were no MPEG artefacts in the transfer. Film-to-video artefacts didn't present with anything of significance and film artefacts were non-existent.

    English subtitles are available on the DVD. They are easily legible in bold yellow and appear to be very accurate.

    Both discs are single sided, dual layer DVD's. The layer change on the first disc (film disc) occurs at 49:31 and was easily noticed.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    There are three audio tracks on the DVD, English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s), English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) and English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s).

    The audio transfer is well suited to the content of the film. Even with some heavy accents, dialogue quality was generally outstanding.

    Audio sync also appeared to be very accurate.

    The original music by Ludovico Einaudi is a beautifully poignant score. This piano based score has been integrated incredibly well to heighten the emotional impact of many key moments in the film. It also contrasts well against the more upbeat, non-original music from the early eighties. The non-original music is provided by various bands including, Toots & The Maytals, The Specials, Soft Cell, Percy Sledge and Dexy's Midnight Runners.

    Apart from the music passages, surround usage was quite understated. Some very effective background noise was apparent during the schoolyard scene early in the film. However, This Is England is basically a dialogue-driven film, so most of the surround sound that relates to the action is ambient effect.

    The subwoofer was kept quite busy throughout the film. Music was the main culprit; in particular, the heavy reggae beat of Toots & The Maytals.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    This two-disc presentation is loaded with quality extras, which compliment the film.

Menu

    The main menu is animated, is 16x9 enhanced and features a sample of reggae music used in the film.

Disc One: 

Audio Commentary - Shane Meadows (Director), Mark Herbert (Producer) and Thomas Turgoose (Actor) 

    A very low key, but highly entertaining and informative commentary. Shane, Mark and Thomas all share a joke while relaying many anecdotes about the production. Plenty of insight is given into the making of the film, including the wonderful use of original and non-original music and the many interesting cameo roles. Occasionally the trio drift off the topic, but it's still definitely worth a listen.

Disc Two:

Interviews

Guardian Interview At BFI Southbank with Shane Meadows - Interviewed By Jason Wood (48:43)

   Similar to our Popcorn Taxi forums, this casual style interview was filmed in a cinema, in front of an audience. This Q & A session was filmed around the time that This Is England was first released in British cinemas. Jason Wood talks one on one with Shane Meadows about his life and filmmaking career. Later in the forum, Shane takes questions from the audience.

Mark Herbert  (11:21)

    Producer Mark Herbert discusses This Is England. This short piece includes behind-the-scenes footage and some brief footage from the successful screening in Rome.

Hair, Makeup and Costume (33:19)

    This very funny extra features Shane Meadows overseeing the radical skinhead hairstyles of his cast. Each cast member takes their turn in the chair, with many of the girls horrified as their beautiful, long flowing hair gets closely cropped. We then see the makeup and costumes for certain cast members, including all of those important tattoos.

Production Design (9:48)

    Production Designer Mark Leese discusses his work on the film, including sets and the collection of props from the period.

Behind The Scenes

    This brilliant collection of segments features a behind-the-scenes look at some of the key scenes in the film. Each segment shows cast rehearsals and crew preparation for shooting each of the scenes. These four pieces are really fascinating and make compulsory viewing for fans of the film.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall