Tag: movies

A Short Road to Longbrook by Bethan Roberts

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.

They may not mean to but they do.

They fill you with the faults they had

And add some extra, just for you.

Philip Larkin

It’s the damage that we do and never know

It’s the words that we don’t say that scare me so

Accidents Will Happen – Elvis Costello

Somewhere between those two quotes lies the terrain that this novel, the latest by Bethan Roberts, inhabits. A Short Road to Longbrook, explores the long shadow cast by mistakes made in the past. It tells the story of Lillian Wells, flipping between 1965, when she was 16 years old, living with her single mother Winnie and 2005, when she is living with her only daughter, Rachel, who is on the verge of leaving home to go to university. As the novel unfolds, characters and relationships acquire added layers of depth and complexity. Mysteries about Lillian’s family history are simultaneously laid bare and made more obscure as questions are answered in a way that only leads to more questions.

Structurally, the novel is a triumph, with the time shifts subtly handled, so that the unfolding of events resembles an archaeological dig, uncovering layers to reveal secrets, surprises, explanations and, inevitably, more questions. The more Lillian discovers about her mother’s troubled history, the more she fears for herself and her own daughter, with the anxiety of repeating the mistakes of the past a constant, nagging worry. Everyday life in the mid-sixties is authentically evoked, with its meat paste sandwiches, its Babychams and editions of Titbits. There are times when it appears to be set in a place that still has one foot in the fifties, where ballroom dancing has more cultural heft in the popular imagination than The Beatles. It seems strange that a sixteen year old with a pixie hair cut in 1965 would not be more plugged in to the swinging sixties, but perhaps this reflects the reality that the lived experience of a particular time is a more mixed one than that which a simplistic social history would have us believe. It was fascinating to see how relationships, particularly between mothers and daughters, continued to be problematic, regardless of the era, even when, forty years later, it’s evident that most women had much more freedom, and many more opportunities than before.

The Longbrook of the title is the local psychiatric hospital, its name having been transformed into a local shorthand, to be spoken of in hushed, fearful tones. To be committed there carried a terrible stigma, and its presence looms large in the lives of the characters. When I was growing up in the North East at around about the same time, our equivalent was Sedgefield, a nearby town with a notorious psych hospital. “If you carry on like that, you’ll end up in Sedgefield” was the standard response to any behaviour that could be deemed eccentric. The fact that, some years later, it became the constituency of future Prime Minister Tony Blair, seems strangely fitting somehow.

Roberts has a real eye for detail and makes a series of acute observations about individual idiosyncrasies that communicate some sense of mental disturbance. Phobias, tics, repetitive behaviours are all described with sensitivity and understanding, as is the portrayal of the slow slide into anorexia and the vice-like grip it has on sufferers that is so hard for onlookers to understand and come to terms with.

There are no easy stereotypes here. Probably the greatest triumph is the portrayal of Jim, Lillian’s first love. Where one might expect a picture of an inadequate man struggling to deal with a spirited woman and falling back on anger and an instinct to save face and control his woman, Jim comes across as a thoughtful soul, who is bowled over by Lillian and tries to understand her and support her. He doesn’t always succeed and shows his anger, frustration and incomprehension on more than one occasion, but in the end, this does not define him. Instead, it positions him as a man who is doing his best to be a good person, no matter what the cost. Roberts portrays his interior response to the challenges presented by his relationship with Lillian with much subtlety and nuance. Here is a man who is caught between observing the social norms of the day and expressing his love in a way that communicates both passion and respect. He is also shown, in the relationship with his daughter, to be the figure that Lillian lacked as a child – a father who was present and communicative.

All in all, this is an engaging, thoughtful and subtle book with an impact that resonates  long after you finish it. A Short Road to Longbrook is published by Chatto and Windus and you can buy it here: https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/a-short-road-to-longbrook-bethan-roberts/7901374?ean=9781784746018&next=t

Springsteen: Deliver me from Nowhere

Slim pickings at this year’s London Film Festival. We struggled with the appalling BFI website, spending many hours lost in its labyrinthine highways and byways, before finally managing to acquire tickets for just two films: Hamnet, directed by Chloe Zhao, and Springsteen: Deliver me from nowhere, directed by Scott Cooper. Hamnet was a juicy treat – a wonderful book that deserved and got, a wonderful film, but it’s not released until January, so you’ll have to wait until then for the review.

The Springsteen film, however, is a horse of a very different colour. It’s out now, so let this review serve as a warning. Go and see it, by all means, but don’t come crying to me afterwards.

It’s based on the 2023 autobiography, Deliver me from Nowhere, by Warren Zanes which like the film focuses on a narrow slice of Springsteen’s life, the period after releasing The River when he infuriated his record company by not going for a commercial follow up, concentrating instead on a stripped back minimalist folk album, harmonica and all, Nebraska. These struggles led to a nervous breakdown of sorts and the book looks at the periods of depression that have plagued Springsteen throughout his adult life.

So what’s wrong with it? Firstly, it takes a fairly basic approach to linking his depression with his childhood. The flashback scenes show us Springsteen senior, played by Steven Graham as a brooding, simmering, silent, fearful presence. There’s little analysis or explanation and it comes across as something of a GCSE Psychology project – thin and cliched. Ironically, the film is saved from a two star rating by the scenes at the end of the film when Springsteen visits his father in LA, and there are some genuinely touching moments between son and father, as regrets are tentatively expressed.

The simplistic linking, though is echoed in the film’s attempts to suggest the inspiration for some of the songs from the album. A scene of driving past an old mansion on a hill, apparently is the inspiration for the song called, err, Mansion on the Hill. Why? Who knows? This technique is repeated throughout the film in an attempt to make the uncinematic, private, long, difficult process of writing into something dramatic or visually striking. It fails and comes across as someone’s first attempts to make a music video in 1983.

Jeremy Strong puts in a solid performance as Jon Landau, Springsteen’s manager, who defends his guy against all criticism from the record company, though this too comes with some difficulties. Landau is essentially a tremendously dull character, a fact underlined by the fact that in many scenes, the most interesting thing going on is the spectacular range of round neck Marks and Spencer type lambswool jumpers that he wears. The bottle green one was particularly fetching. There are also recurring scenes with his wife that essentially just allow him to explain the issues to her (and therefore the audience) re the record company locking horns with Bruce. A really tremendous part (not) for Grace Gummer.

I can’t help comparing it with A Complete Unknown, the Dylan biopic from last year. That was a joyous, glorious ride of a film, one that delivered you into the foyer after two hours or so with a dazed, permanent smile on your face. And the key difference is the music. The Dylan film was a conveyor belt of great song after great song. And great in the sense of not just the lyrics or melody or sound, but in the sense of being groundbreaking. You don’t get groundbreaking from Springsteen. He trundles along a much narrower set of tracks, and in the end is just a wee bit samey. Sorry Springsteen disciples, but that’s just the way it is.

His strength is in live performance. Watching Bruce and the E Street Band in concert is a transformative, life enhancing experience. And, of course, we get none of that here. Just a couple of perfunctory scenes of Springsteen guesting with some friends at a small venue in New Jersey. What a waste!

In the end, I was left feeling rather sorry for Jeremy Allen White, who has said working on the film  left him feeling rather unwell. I’m not surprised. After this and The Bear, he needs to get away from brooding, intense men of few words with intimacy issues. Maybe it’s time for a RomCom, Jezza.

As for Bruce, I prefer to think of him like this. Romantically glossing over the reality of a difficult life perhaps, and maybe the film deserves credit for trying to be a slightly different Music Biopic, but sometimes you just want your heroes mythologised.

Overall verdict: A Dull Trudge.