Extras:
Trailer, Featurettes: Behing The Wheel, Mike Leigh's Characters
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Director:
Mike Leigh
(All or Nothing, Career Girls, Happy-Go-Lucky, High Hopes, Life is Sweet, Meantime, Naked, Secrets & Lies, Topsy-Turvy, Vera Drake, TV: BBC2 Playhouse, Play for Today)
Producer:
Simon Channing-Williams
Screenplay:
Mike Leigh
Music:
Gary Yershon
Cast :
Poppy: Sally Hawkins
Scott: Eddie Marsan
Zoe: Alexis Zegerman
Heather: Sylvestra Le Touzel
Dawn: Andrea Riseborough
Alice: Sinead Matthews
Tim: Samuel Roukin
Suzy: Kate O'Flynn
Tash: Sarah Niles
Bookseller: Elliot Cowan
Tramp: Stanley Townsend
Flamenco - Spanish Dance Teacher: Karina Fernandez
Flamenco Student: Rebekah Staton
Helen: Caroline Martin
Jamie: Oliver Maltman
Ezra: Nonso Anozie
Happy-Go-Lucky
is so-called because it reflects the bright and sunny demeanour of its lead character, Poppy, played by Sally Hawkins, right,
who's made a great name for herself in various film, TV, theatre and radio productions over the last 10 years, although she's
best known for me as the voice of the wonderful Ping, the receptionist for Felix Jeffrey & Associates in Radio 4's Ed Reardon's
Week, balancing perfectly her mix of cheeky, bossy and just a bit mental.
Poppy is 30 years old, doesn't mind that she hasn't found the man of her dreams
yet, works as a primary school teacher in Camden and puts a happy face on everything, even down to a moment early on when she has her
bike stolen. The solution? She sees it as a cue to finally getting round to learning to drive, and rather meets her match in
her firebrand of an instructor in Scott (Eddie Marsan - again, someone who's had his fair share of TV and film roles
over the years, even if the name isn't instantly recognisable, but I remember him mostly from his appearance as Stoat in an
episode of the BBC2 comedy, Game On).
Poppy has a serious side when required, but she tries to see the lighter side of life most of the time, which shows up when
she takes a spur-of-the-moment offer from headmistress Heather (Sylvestra Le Touzel) to go flamenco dancing. Most
of the rest of the time she spends with flatmate and co-worker Zoe (Alexis Zegerman, bottom pic with Poppy), often in the pub with Tash (Sarah Niles)
or on nights out with friends such as Dawn (Andrea Riseborough, who played Margaret Thatcher in a recent BBC4 drama)
and Alice (Sinead Matthews, aka Jenny from BBC3's Ideal), although sadly after seeing the names of the latter two
in the cast list it was disappointing that they weren't in it any further than the first few scenes.
I'm not particularly a fan of any description of Mike Leigh's films as opposed to being the kind of person who must see every
single one of them. In fact, I can only remember seeing Life is Sweet and I didn't go a bundle on that, despite all the
media's plaudits. However, I can see that he gets the best out of his actors by having them engage in semi-improvised
conversations, so he'll give them the basic topics to get through and let things go from there. This technique has also worked
brilliantly of late in the BBC's The Thick Of It.
Sally Hawkins is fantastic as the slightly-annoying Poppy, who also brings families into the plot with one sister, Suzy (Kate O'Flynn),
appearing early on and then later she pays a visit to her other sister, Helen (Caroline Martin), who's pregnant, and her husband Jamie (Oliver Maltman),
while Eddie Marsan really excels in his supporting role as Scott (right, with Poppy), whose topics of conversation
extended to little more than his instructor mantra of "En-ra-hah" in relation to the mirrors used while driving and also his
conspiracy theories about the world such as the education system producing left-brain prisoners, and that as the Washington
Monument is 555ft above the ground and 111ft below, that adds up to 666 - the number of the devil.
In fact, all of the people here are believable characters and Leigh ensures that the film doesn't overdo anything in that
respect. However, if I had a complaint it would be that bits of the film here and there do go on too long and it could do with
cutting down by about 15 minutes to make it tighter.
The film is presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen and looks excellent throughout with no problems. Poppy's outlook on life
is reflected in the bright sunny days which dominate most of the outdoor scenes. The Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack conveys
dialogue and music perfectly but with no surprises, but then this isn't an action film.
There aren't a great deal of extras on this disc. We have a Theatrical Trailer (1:52), presented in the original
2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen and Dolby Surround sound, but for some reason the dialogue comes only out of the right-hand
front speaker, with the music numbers coming out of the other - this isn't the case for the film itself, thankfully.
Then comes two featurettes - Behing The Wheel (4:26), which is a look at the driving scenes between Poppy and Scott,
showing how the car was set up for multiple cameras and for driving on the roads while going about the shoot. And then
Mike Leigh's Characters (27:21), which combines the actors talking about their roles with the director's take on their
performances and how the characters relate to the actors.
In one of these, Eddie talks about how Scott found his look in the late '80s and just stuck with it, and I can see where
he's coming from.
However, the BBFC site also lists a 36-minute "Conversation with Mike Leigh" as being rated in relation to this film, but
it's a supplemental that's not to be found on this disc.
The film contains a mere 12 chapters, which isn't good for a 2-hour film as I always work on a rule of thumb of one every five
minutes as a reasonable figure. Subtitles are available in English and the main menu features clips from the film as well
as being scored with a looped piece of music from the film.
Before the menu even appears, though, we see trailers for Caramel, The Wave and Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, but, Momentum,
as I've said before, we are long past the age of the rental video where this practice was commonplace. You now have somewhere
these should go: the extras menu. Please don't make them stick out like this.
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
Happy-Go-Lucky
is so-called because it reflects the bright and sunny demeanour of its lead character, Poppy, played by Sally Hawkins, right,
who's made a great name for herself in various film, TV, theatre and radio productions over the last 10 years, although she's
best known for me as the voice of the wonderful Ping, the receptionist for Felix Jeffrey & Associates in Radio 4's Ed Reardon's
Week, balancing perfectly her mix of cheeky, bossy and just a bit mental.
I'm not particularly a fan of any description of Mike Leigh's films as opposed to being the kind of person who must see every
single one of them. In fact, I can only remember seeing Life is Sweet and I didn't go a bundle on that, despite all the
media's plaudits. However, I can see that he gets the best out of his actors by having them engage in semi-improvised
conversations, so he'll give them the basic topics to get through and let things go from there. This technique has also worked
brilliantly of late in the BBC's The Thick Of It.
The film is presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen and looks excellent throughout with no problems. Poppy's outlook on life
is reflected in the bright sunny days which dominate most of the outdoor scenes. The Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack conveys
dialogue and music perfectly but with no surprises, but then this isn't an action film.