Happy-Go-Lucky

Bea says: Seen in Hull, always an appropriate setting for a Mike Leigh film. I've seen quite a bit of Mike Leigh over the years and don't actually find him as bleak as many say he is, although he is always thought-provoking, and Happy-Go-Lucky was no exception. I mulled it over for quite a while afterwards. I'd read a couple of reviews along the lines of "Mike Leigh does happy" etc etc, and afterwards wondered if the reviewers and I had actually watched the same film - I didn't think it was particularly "happy". The main character was fully drawn - there were many things I liked about her; I could imagine being her friend, meeting her for drinks or coffee, but she also got on my nerves. Her character mellows and deepens through the film as a series of events puts her "happy-go-lucky" nature to the test. However, it also felt like there was more than this to the character and film, something about a life we either do or don't face up to, and what that does to us.
***1/2

Cecil says: 15 minutes into this film, I was bored. I hadn't seen a Mike Leigh film for years and had forgotten how mind-numbingly mundane the setting of his films can be. Did I really want to sit through over two hours of the sort of conversation I might have had 25 years ago and with a main character who had the most annoying, nervous giggle. Funnily enough, the Hull cinema advertised this film as 2h20 long, whereas the newspaper reviews say it's 1h58 (did the Hull cinema get a special un-cut version??) - no matter: by 30 minutes in, I was riveted and the time flew by for the rest of the film.

As Bea says, the characters slowly grew - on us as film-goers and in themselves. There was a strange scene with a tramp which left me rather non-plussed (and actually made me wonder if the Hull cinema had received a 'cut' version, with the bit taken out which would have made sense of the tramp episode); I can't believe anybody would stay with such a mad driving instructor as long as she did; and the poor, pregnant and boringly suburban sister seemed a bit of a cartoon character (I mean, not everybody in the suburbs spends all their time looking after their hydrangeas, and just because Bea and I have done this Bank Holiday does NOT make us a boring, suburban couple...or does it? - answers on a postcard, please to Mike Leigh...)

***