#767: FREARS, Stephen: My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)

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FREARS, Stephen (United Kingdom)
My Beautiful Laundrette [1985]
Spine #767
Blu-ray


Stephan Frears was at the forefront of the British cinematic revival of the mid-1980s, and the delightfully transgressive My Beautiful Laundrette is his greatest triumph of the period. Working from a richly layered script by Hanif Kureishi, who was soon to be an internationally renowned writer, Frears tells an uncommon love story that takes place between a young South London Pakistani man (Gordon Warnecke), who decides to open an upscale laundromat to make his family proud, and his childhood friend, a skinhead (Daniel Day-Lewis, in a breakthrough role) who volunteers to help make his dream a reality. This culture-clash comedy is also a subversive work of social realism that dares to address racism, homophobia, and sociopolitical marginalization in Margaret Thatcher's England.

98 minutes
Color
Monaural
1:66:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2015
Director/Writers


Written by Hanif Kureishi.
Stephen Frears was 44 when he directed My Beautiful Laundrette.

Other Frears films in the Collection:

#469: The Hit (1984)
#1246: The Grifters (1990)

The Film

A

Film Rating (0-60):

60

The Extras

The Booklet

Ten-page wraparound featuring an essay by critic Graham Fuller.

Commentary

None.

Conversation

Between director Frears and producer Colin MacCabe.

Interviews

With writer Kureishi, producers Tim Bevan and Sarah Radclyffe, and DP Oliver Stapleton.

Trailer

Extras Rating (0-40):

39

60 + 39 =

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