Naked

**Unpleasant and uncomfortable, often highly appreciated by critics, it is understandably forgotten by the public.** Mike Leigh directs with skill and intelligence a film that is far from pleasing everyone and that doesn't mind being uncomfortable: it tells the story of a man who hides in an ex-girlfriend's house to avoid being prosecuted for rape, and which we will follow through various adventures and dialogues that oscillate between nihilism, the “nonsense” and the deeply philosophical. He's an unpleasant man with somewhat sadistic touches, but the film is full of unpleasant characters in a dark story. The film was a considerable success among critics, winning major awards at Cannes and being nominated for a BAFTA, but it is one of those films that is so philosophical and perverse that I can understand why it is so forgotten. The film's greatest strength, for me, is the enormous performance of David Thewlis, one of the most competent and consistent British actors, a veteran with a career worthy of envy and who has already shone in a multitude of projects, but who has not been particularly noted or esteemed as he deserves. I don't dare say this is his best film, but it's clearly in his top five. The remaining cast, in which we can positively highlight the efforts of Lesley Sharp and Greg Cruttwell, is much less interesting, but manages to give us good moments and good characters. Technically, the film presents a very well-crafted cinematography which emphasizes shadows, half-light, and indirect lighting. This could not be more appropriate for the environment that the director wanted to create, and ends up being the great technical point of honor: the sets and costumes are well done, but without merit notes, and the effects and soundtrack are so discreet that it are limited to the essentials. Moving through the dark, misty and dense environment of the London underworld, there is nothing particularly friendly, cheerful or flowery. There is an effort to expose with a certain rawness the moral nakedness and dark weaknesses of each character. In between, there are several sex and nudity scenes, including an explicit frontal nude of the protagonist. However, there is no intention of beauty, sensuality or eroticism here. This is a grotesque, ugly and clumsy nudity that bothers us. It is, therefore, not a film that I plan to revisit one day or that I can say that I liked, even though I recognize its merits and quality ratings.

Yikes, but this is a depressingly bleak story. David Thewlis is a rather dissolute and violent Mancunian who arrives in London with nowhere to stay. "Johnny" makes his way to the home of his ex "Louise" (Lesley Sharp). They briefly hook up again, but he soon tires of what he can get on a plate and sets off back onto the streets for a series of encounters with the nocturnal types who inhabit the city and provide us with a series of quirky short stories. Whilst "Johnny" is out philandering, "Louise" and her flatmate "Sophie" (Catrin Cartlidge) are being bullied by their landlord - the sadistic "Jeremy" (Greg Crutwell) who takes sexual brutality to an whole new level. In the end, the streets take their revenge on "Johnny" and he must return to her home where things finally come to some sort of an head. It's got something of the observational documentary to it this. The style of photography allies well with the angry (and ripe) but sometimes quite potent dialogue to create a cast of characters that vacillate between the obnoxious and the needy, the violent and even the loving - in a perverse sort of fashion. Thewlis is on great form, as is the rather unpleasant Cruttwell who spends much of the film in his underpants exuding a menace that ought not work so well - he's a small and underwhelming man - but it does. Lesley Sharp also works well, though quite what she'd ever have seen in the scrawny and odious "Johnny" is anyone's guess. That's ultimately maybe what makes this film rise above the grottiness of it's grittiness. It's not a nice film to watch, nor do I think it has any profound or telling underlying message to impart - but it is worth a watch.