After the tragic suicide of a heavily bullied schoolgirl the rest of her classmates get the day off. Centering on 15 year old Trife and his two friends, Jay and Moony, Kidulthood follows the adventure and misadventures of a day in the life of some typical London youths.
Kidulthood is the "controversial" film penned by Noel Clarke who is best known as Mickey Smith in Dr Who. Not that I personally think there is anything controversial about it at all. Really how can people continue to be shocked by the fact 15 year old kids have sex, get high and get into fights? Is this really a revelation, because it’s over a decade since I went to school and that’s what kids did then and I am pretty sure they were doing it a long time before that. The British papers got all upset because the film showed kids using mobile phone cameras to catch some of their antics and claimed the film promoted "happy slapping". However, the film is just a reflection of life, kids had been doing this before the film and the only reason the phenomena is new is because kids all have camera phones now. I'm pretty sure if they had been widespread 10 years earlier kids would have used them to capture things which they consider funny, which when you're young often tends to be other peoples misfortune.
The film attempts to reflect a slice of urban life, which is normally only expressed in the form of music. It's not really a "Ghetto" film as it's likely to be passed off as because of it's high proportion of black characters, it’s just a film about youths on the dawn of adulthood. A look at children doing adult things while still not having the self control maturity brings. Even if you’re not from London. if you’re from the UK, under 40 and went to a state school you're likely to recognise things from your own past (even if you are trying to forget). If you are 15 now you’re likely to think life as a teen can get a lot rougher than this in many parts of London and the UK in general. It’s too easy to say it only happens with black kids or poor white chavs or it's a London thing. But as the film reflects in it's mixture of characters there are many middle class kids who touch this lifestyle too.
I expected to hate this; I thought it would have me cringing with drama school kids trying to be bad. However, while it does suffer from those pesky trained actor kids who do at times seem out of place, it did manage to hold my interest. The characters writer Noel Clark and director Menhaj Huda have created however suffer because they are very two dimensional. The Bully, The Pregnant Teen, The Posh Kid who wants to be down, the Easy Girl etc, etc. The kids seem to portray universal stereotypes that everyone can recognise rather than complex individuals and this does weaken the film. That said it does have the advantage of giving everyone a character they can recognise or identify with. Many people knew a girl who was bullied because she was pretty or guys that hung around younger kids to make themselves seem badder when really they where socially inept and lame. Many will have been at a house party where trouble has kicked off as drunken teens loose control and teen pregnancy is nothing new, much as the Daily Mail may try and tell you it is.
For those in North America films like this may come as a shock ... "What!? Everyone does not sound like Kira Knightly and Hugh Grant?". Much like La Haine (Not that this film comes even close to La Haine) shows us the other side of the worlds "most romantic city", Kidulthood goes some way to dispelling the romantic idea of a fog covered London filled with rather polite chaps in bowlers. A recent tourist guide described English cities as places where speaking to a stranger is almost tantamount to physical assault and sadly that’s close to true.
The film is driven by a soundtrack of UK urban music which while it may not be your thing does fit what’s happening on the screen. With the likes of White rappers Skinnyman and The Streets, grime star Dizzy Racal, UK hip hop legend Roots Manuva and urban dance producers Audio Bullies all lending there sounds to the vibe. There are rumours that if this gets a stateside release they will be replaced by US rap, which would be a mistake as the music they have chosen here is reflective on the life seen on screen.
One of the problems with this and many British films is it never quite shakes the feeling you are watching some kind of extended TV special. The actors and acting feels very much like it belongs in "East Enders", "Casualty" or "The Bill", hell I am pretty sure some of these people have been in all three shows.
Where the films works best is because of its honesty; cabs don't stop for kids in caps, but at the same time kids in caps are most likely to jump the without paying - its not just giving you one side. There are some nice touches like the "shoplifting scene" which shows how mainstream society does contribute to the "Fuck you" attitude many youths adopt. If you are pushed to the fringes you have no real reason to feel any loyalty or respect for certain elements. The cliche characters are both it's strength and it's weakness, yes many people can connect to them, but once you do there is little to keep that connection as you frankly don't really care what happens to them. Maybe the biggest weakness comes in the films ending, not every urban, youth or gangster films needs to end this way, it's getting boring.
All in all Kidulthood makes worthwhile viewing, but for me I can't see myself wanting re-watch it. However maybe people in the actual age demographic of the characters may.
