Somers Town is endless - in the very literal meaning of the word.
The opening minutes of this nicely shot black and white piece, set just north of London's Marylebone Road, are wonderfully atmospheric and you settle into your seat with a sense that you are about to be greatly entertained in some way, such is the deftness of the set-up. The acting is uniformly excellent and you quickly warm to the plight of all the characters. So far so wonderful.
But, as any screenplay-writer or script-reader will tell you, the set-up is easy, it's writing a compelling story that's the tough part. Soon the unanswered questions start piling up. What is the lad from Nottingham running from and why is no one after him? Is the Polish lad's 'Dad' really his Dad (this one gets answered eventually) and why isn't he in some kind of school? And then we get to the point at which the film stops. And stop it does because there is no ENDING. Just when the film seems to be changing up a gear and you are suckered into thinking some questions will be answered or resolved, you are left with a casually shot color sequence that would be poor as a mid-film montage but is an absolute stunner of a let-down as a resolution.
The film-makers obviously worked so hard on this film. The sets, the wardrobe, the cinematography, the casting, the acting, the editing and much of the direction are all notable for their sharp and sensitive choices but whoever thought this casually tossed off last two minutes of color film was an ending or a resolution? With some thought, and some hard choices made over the keyboard over a couple of nights this could have been a truly remarkable film.
What a shame for all concerned.
The opening minutes of this nicely shot black and white piece, set just north of London's Marylebone Road, are wonderfully atmospheric and you settle into your seat with a sense that you are about to be greatly entertained in some way, such is the deftness of the set-up. The acting is uniformly excellent and you quickly warm to the plight of all the characters. So far so wonderful.
But, as any screenplay-writer or script-reader will tell you, the set-up is easy, it's writing a compelling story that's the tough part. Soon the unanswered questions start piling up. What is the lad from Nottingham running from and why is no one after him? Is the Polish lad's 'Dad' really his Dad (this one gets answered eventually) and why isn't he in some kind of school? And then we get to the point at which the film stops. And stop it does because there is no ENDING. Just when the film seems to be changing up a gear and you are suckered into thinking some questions will be answered or resolved, you are left with a casually shot color sequence that would be poor as a mid-film montage but is an absolute stunner of a let-down as a resolution.
The film-makers obviously worked so hard on this film. The sets, the wardrobe, the cinematography, the casting, the acting, the editing and much of the direction are all notable for their sharp and sensitive choices but whoever thought this casually tossed off last two minutes of color film was an ending or a resolution? With some thought, and some hard choices made over the keyboard over a couple of nights this could have been a truly remarkable film.
What a shame for all concerned.