SoTrumpBelieve Must See Movie...

ShangLuda Admirable film.

Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Borserie it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

snowyprecipice Starring a very young and dashing Daniel Day-Lewis and an relatively unknown but charming Gordon Warnecke, this is a movie set in the 1980s in the UK and deals with the issues of that time. It's a very subtle film that keeps you pondering what the characters are thinking and why they do the things they do. The two leads are very good-looking (together, too) and share a certain chemistry that's very at ease and comfortable, much like their relationship. No budding romance, they kind of just meld together and deal with the things that happen in the film.Mostly it deals with race issues and subtle homophobia. Omar (Warnecke) is smart and rather cunning, trying to make the business his uncle gives him successful. He employs a childhood friend and street punk (who he hasn't seen since he left school), Johnny (Day-Lewis) to help him run the business and deal with the riff-raff. The two have to deal with the expectations of Omar's family and the snide remarks Johnny's street "friends" make about him working for a Paki.(Also, some people who watched the film got confused about Tania's role in all this?? I thought it was obvious. She made advances on Omar but didn't get any reaction. Omar gets pressured to ask for her hand in marriage from his family, but nothing really comes of it. Johnny gets jealous and goes gallivanting with Tania to make Omar jealous. But all this happens in a very quiet way i.e. their intentions aren't clear unless you think about it. In the end Tania realizes they only have eyes for each other and she was kind of a pawn in their plans)I can't help but add that the two leads are super hot together. I like the secondary and tertiary characters too. The film feels very real and believable. Kind of slice of life but bigger.

lasttimeisaw Under the iron curtain of Thatcherism in the 1980s, UK veteran Stephen Frears' fourth feature film is an ethnic barrier-breaker in the world queer cinema, much as its fervid confrontations between races and social classes, the central closeted romance between an ex-punk Johnny (Day-Lewis) and a Pakistani Briton Omar (Warnecke) is nurtured with robust intimacy and élan. Enclosed by a synth-pop heavy pulse, the film starts with Johnny and his gang being expelled from their squatting apartment by some heavies, a similar territory Daniel Day-Lewis would retread in IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER (1993), then cutting to introduce another protagonist, Omar, a college dropout sent to work for his uncle Nasser (Jaffrey) by his bed-ridden father (Seth), a disillusioned idealist and leftist), in Nasser's car-washing lot, Omar meets Nasser's business partner Salim (Branche), a menacing and overbearing bully who conducts some seedy business and Nasser's mistress Rachel (Anne Field), who assumes a quite modernized view of being the other woman, but the entire entanglement will end up with some ludicrous witchcraft. Omar is ambitious and fast-learning, soon he gets the permission to run Nasser's dilapidated laundromat, and reunites with Johnny, who has been his best friend since childhood, together they embezzle the dough from Salim's underhand drug smuggling and refurbish the laundrette and make a successful business, their romance is also rekindled. But at the same time, Omar is obliged by Nasser to marry his disobedient daughter Tania (Wolf), and Johnny is reckoned as a betrayer by his ne'er-do-well gang members since he is working for Palestinians (also as an unscrewer for kick out Nasser's impecunious tenants), in addition to the conflict between Omar and Salim, there will be blood in the end. Violence is a requisite in depicting the gulf between well-off immigrants and poverty-stricken native malcontents, xenophobia, racial bias and chauvinism, all can be easily related and incited under the harsh environs, but Frears doesn't attempt to make a point by resorting too much to the excesses, whereas the tender, masculine attraction between two men is rendered with cozy panache and passion, truly, it is an in-the-closet relationship, but it is not about coming-out or AIDs, these routine trappings of the era, their future might be a moot point, however, the virtue of their love strikes as comfortingly authentic and endearing, thanks to the great pair Warnecke and Day-Lewis, one is resolutely sincere and the other is overwhelmingly charismatic, they do make a desirable couple together! Juxtaposed with its peers like MAURICE (1987, 7/10) and ANOTHER COUNTRY (1984, 8/10), MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE's grassroots ambiance and buoyant undertones applicably complement the missing piece of the UK queer cinema menagerie, not revolutionary, but a wonderful bliss indeed.

stephparsons My Beautiful Launderette is an inspired movie and a perfect example of how the British manage to make brilliant, (fairly) low-budget movies. Gorden Warnecke plays Omar Ali, the go-getting son of an alcoholic Pakistani father and Daniel Day-Lewis is 'Johnny', an 'ex-thug' who is Omar's on again/off again lover. Launderette could be interpreted as a film about racism, implied homophobia, and the British class system and does indeed comprise all these themes but without offering answers, without passing judgement, without obvious heroes and/or villains and with a minimal pity quotient for those who get the bad end of the stick.The plot is simple, and almost incidental to the movie, but does provide a good vehicle for the more obvious subjects covered. Omar's Uncle, a seemingly successful businessman, offers Omar a fruitless, failing, shabby, thug-filled launderette to run, maybe as a test of the boy's ambition and drive, and as a favour to Omar's father. Johnny, being on the dole, and having just been kicked out of his lodgings for, one presumes, some nefarious, petty crimes, hooks up once more with Omar and together they get to work beautifying the launderette. There is much irony in Launderette, including the fact that Johnny has only just broken away from the brutish gang of disaffected, unemployed, racist youth and, despite being in love with Omar all along, participated readily in racist attacks and, along with his fellow hooligans, referred to all Asians as 'Pakis'. This classic film paints a very accurate picture of the British recession in the mid 80s which gave rise to an 'underclass' of sorts, who either couldn't find work, or didn't want to work and quite gladly lived 'on the dole' for months or years. The unemployed white youth provide an obvious contrast to the hard working Asians, giving rise to an illogical, but all too real phenomenon of resentment toward the Asians who 'have taken all the jobs'. Another striking contrast is that between Omar and Johnny; Omar's ambitiousness and Johnny's lack of a work ethic, Omar's ethnicity and Johnny's erstwhile racism; Omar's optimism (almost verging on naivety) and Johnny's jaded, indifferent disposition. Launderette also astutely demonstrates the disparity between the older and younger Asian generations; the 'elders' having been raised in almost certain hardship in Pakistan, immigrating to England, finding jobs, working hard and making money, while their children grow up in England, in the midst of a recession and have the same jaded, cynical views on work and society as their white counterparts. Daniel Day-Lewis is phenomenal as the conflicted Johnny who may appear to be a mindless, lazy, none too bright, trouble-making ruffian but doesn't really care about risking the destruction of his 'bad boy' reputation when he shows such sensitivity to Omar and thoroughly immerses himself in the challenge of revamping the launderette. It is at this point that we see what power Omar has over Johnny and they fall into a virtual boss/unpaid employee role. The irony is that Omar's extended family may appear to be successful but much of their power and wealth comes through the dodgy dealings of Omar's cousin Salim, the 'cool' and brutish 'king pin', played excellently by Derrick Branche. Salim is the one with, supposedly, all the 'power'. But his money and 'power' within his Pakistani community mean little in the end. Racism prevails and he is just another 'Paki' at the mercy of vicious louts.My Beautiful Launderette is bleak yet hopeful, brutal yet sensitive, optimistic yet dispiriting. It offers more questions than it proffers answers, illustrates the brutal pointlessness of racism without presenting any solutions or any justice for its victims. It is objective, unsentimental, intelligent and captivating and I believe it deserves to be regarded as a classic of our times.

Tim Kidner So says Saeed Jaffrey, easily one of the most recognisable Indian actors, at the film's start and sets the tone for this early Film 4 offering from 1985 as the wheeler-dealer uncle, and who typified Thatcherism's era of entrepreneurial immigrants.Radio Times awards a rare five stars for this provocative and ground- breaking film from the now hugely successful director, now, of Stephen Frears and of course, for Daniel Day Lewis, it might have been his last, presumably such a contentious issue inter-racial gay sex would have been seen (and still viewed as), had he not been both brave AND very good.This was just Frear's second feature film and whilst today the production values lag, many of the scenes are (necessarily?) contrived and the acting variable, it still says a lot. Lest we forget, launderettes were actually in wide existence then, romanticised by jeans adverts and featuring regularly in TV soap Eastenders. If that last bit sounds pedantic, Eastenders itself was seen as ground-breaking and immensely popular, with ratings in the 10s of millions.Saeed's hypocritical (he has a white mistress) Nasser only hands over the laundrette to his nephew (Omar) because he's too lazy to run it himself and it's a thorn in his side. Omar, being one of Thatcher's mass army of 3 million unemployed takes to the challenge and equally unemployed white, former National Front member Johnny (Day-Lewis), a schoolfriend of Omar's get drafted in to help refit the run-down laundrette and to turn it into a Palace full of washing machines.As you can imagine, Johnny's past friends find much to dislike about the company he now keeps, especially as he's been to prison for his past activities and now is not only only cohorting with the Front's seen enemy but having unbridled, active sex with one who is the same sex. Issues around the pressure for Omar to get married, by arrangement are very relevant, both as in being Pakistani and homosexual.For my money, there are just too many small characters, doing little things that we never see again; they do not contribute to the film and if anything, dissolve its strengths. I'm also not keen on Gordon Warnecke's (Omar) performance, his monosyllabic recital of his lines show no depth. Omar may actually have spoken like that but it fails to convince.The romance element is boosted by the way that the refurbished laundrette is to be launched as a dreamy magical palace, with a razzle- dazzle showbiz look and can be seen as the aspiration for people who have little to make a life for themselves.I first saw My Beautiful Laundrette about when it was released and knew friends in the gay community - and have watched the DVD a couple of times since. Those friends saw it more of a championing beacon to their cause and lifestyle and less of a political and economic barometer. Almost no such films were made almost thirty years ago and whilst I'm sure many did just see it as a pro-gay drama, that it was (and remains) a good film is a huge bonus.