Acclaimed British director Andrea Arnold returns with this drama. 12 year old Bailey (Nykiya Adams) lives with her older brother Hunter (Jason Buda) and her father Bug (Barry Keoghan), who raises them alone in a squat in northern Kent. Bug doesn’t devote much time to them as he prepares for his upcoming wedding to his new girlfriend and tries to find ways of raising cash. Bailey looks for attention and adventure elsewhere and meets a mysterious man called Bird (Franz Rogowski).
This is a mixture of actual gritty realism, depicting people on the fringes of society and magical realism, especially towards the end when we see Bird’s character in a different light. I did not find that meshed together completely, so it felt like two films welded together at times. Arnold, though, does hold things together with her restless, roving hand held camera shots. Keoghan is great as always, Adams impressive in her debut role, and Rogowski, an actor I have not warmed to in the past, finds here a role that is perfect for his talents.
At times, with the subplot of abuse of Bailey’s Mum by her latest partner, there was a danger that the sheer bleakness of everyone’s life almost tipped things into parody territory. But the depiction of Bailey starting to become an adult whilst struggling to be seen kept it grounded and me invested in her story.
Rating: 7 out of 10