ALLAN HUNTER at the Movies

MIKE LEIGH has the ability to make everyday life seem much more compelling than a Hollywood blockbuster. His characters are marked by a complex humanity that means they linger in the mind rather than disappear into oblivion. His latest triumph, Happy-Go-Lucky, features an award-winning performance from Sally Hawkins and is one of the most beguiling British films of this year.

Hawkins plays Poppy, a London schoolteacher with a perennially sunny disposition. She has an ability to look on the bright side of life and a wardrobe that assaults the eyes with gaudy colours and the most unlikely combinations. In the early stages of the film she seems an insufferable soul who never shuts up. The triumph of the film is that the more you discover about Poppy the more you learn to love her.

Happy-Go-Lucky is almost the flipside of Mike Leigh’s Naked. There, David Thewlis gave a towering performance as a man filled with hatred and cynicism. Hawkins is no less impressive as a woman defined by her innate compassion. The film reveals her character through the people she meets and the experience she endures.

One of the key figures she meets is driving instructor Scott (Eddie Marsan), a man burning with rage and twisted by paranoia. Poppy seems the only one able to tell him how desperately he needs help.

Happy-Go-Lucky is filled with little telling moments and vital characters as Poppy decides to take a flamenco class, has a strange encounter with a homeless man, visits her pregnant sister and starts to date child psychiatrist Tim (Samuel Roukin).

Told with good humour and drama that has the sting of truth, the film builds into a joyous celebration of Poppy’s indomitable spirit. This is Mike Leigh at his best.

Nationwide release

Director: Mike Leigh
Stars: Sally Hawkins, Alexis Zegerman, Eddie Marsan, Samuel Roukin, Andrea Riseborough
Screenwriter: Mike Leigh
Certificate: 15
Running time: 118 mins
Country: UK
Year: 2008