Capital Celluloid 2023 — Day 270: Thu Sep 28

My Beautiful Launderette (Frears, 1985): BFI Southbank, NFT3, 8.30pm


This film (also screening on September 20th) is part of the is part of the excellent 'Acting Hard' season at BFI Southbank.

Chicago Reader review:
Directed for television by Stephen Frears (The Hit) from a scenario by playwright Hanif Kureishi, this is a uniquely plausible portrait of life in England, yet its appeal isn’t limited to social realism—it also has a twist of buoyant fantasy and romance (1986). Omar, a Pakistani student, charms his wealthy uncle into letting him take over one of his less successful enterprises—a crud-caked launderette in a questionable South London neighborhood. He solicits the help of Johnny, an old school buddy grown into a surly street tough, and as their plans for the business take shape they fall in love. Frears doesn’t treat the gay relationship as anything remarkable—which makes the film itself remarkable—but simply as a surge of encouraging human feeling against a background of economic devastation and racial divisiveness.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

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