Naked

One of the most powerful British films of the 90s. Mike Leigh directs David Thewlis in an unrelenting, uncompromisingly cynical portrayal of self-loathing and alienation

In this, Leigh's toughest, most uncompromising work for cinema, Thewlis turns in a stunningly uningratiating performance. He utterly immerses himself in the role of Johnny, an articulate, disenfranchised angry young man, who's escaped Manchester after a bit of rough outdoor sex turns into something a lot like rape.

Johnny flees to London to hook up with an old girlfriend Louise (Sharp). While wandering around the city he gives free rein to his unfocused rage and indulges in some further degrading sexual encounters, notably with the dippy and compliant Sophie (Cartlidge).

This is brilliant stuff, but hard to stomach. Once again Leigh proves what a big problem he has with London's bourgeoisie, particularly with his portrayal of the smooth, sexually exploitative Jeremy (Cruttwell).

Leigh gives us so little to cling to here. There is barely a symphathetic character aside from security guard Brian (Wright), who dreams of escaping to Ireland. So the viewer is stuck with the edgy autodidact Johnny. It's an immensely powerful film about self-loathing and urban alienation, but, Thewlis' remarkable performanace notwithstading, staying the two hour distance is asking for a lot, even from die-hard Leigh fans.

In my adult life, this is the one and only film that has ever moved me to tears with its ending. It was like watching Michelangel applying his final daub to the Sistene Chapel, the incomprehensible achievement of a perfect artistic vision, and the attainment of a transcendent brilliance.

For years, I had fantasized about becoming a writer / director, and actually put forth some appreciable effort to that end. This film, Mike Leigh's incomparable, unprecedented masterwork, cured me of that fantasy. He said, and did, in two hours, all that I could have hoped to achieve in an entire career, and it became gapingly obvious to me that I had no business in this medium.

There is no "story" here, except that of the distilled essence of the hopeless pre-Millenial Western man, robbed of the promised nuclear annihilation he had always consciously feared, but subconsciously hoped for, if only to put the world out of its misery. The naked and the lost, the wandering spectre of the sentient living dead, and the pitiful yet mercifully ignorant companions that cross his path.

Without a doubt, Mike Leigh's Naked is one of the most brilliant examples of filmmaking I have ever seen.

David Thewlis is nothing short of genius as the aimless Johnny, a combustible combination of brilliance and depression, who's mere presence in anyone's purview contaminates and destroys with the effectiveness of Round-Up.

Mesmerizing and fast-paced, there is no shortage of excellence in the smaller plots and characters: Greg Cruttwell is spectacular as the pompous, nouveau-riche Jeremy, and the two female leads, Leslie Sharp and Katrin Cartlidge provide well balanced juxtaposition as two very different femmes damaged.

Not for the faint of heart, Naked will test one's own philosophy, and leave you stripped bare.

An unemployed - but intelligent - social misfit goes on the run to London following a back alley rape, but finds The Capital just as desperate and alienating as his native Manchester.

This is one of the hardest films I have ever had to review. Topics such as urban alienation, career-choice unemployment, leeching, homelessness, drug taking and sexual violence would normally send me running for cover; but what we have here is so well constructed and so skilfully acted that it transcends it own headline topics.

This is a classic case of car-wreck film making: You don't praise or celebrate much, yet it is deeply fascinating and even hypnotic. People are tap dancing on the edge of a metaphorical cliff - some are there of there of their own free will.

Director Mike Leigh's semi-improvisational style doesn't always work, but here it really delivers something unique. You feel that you are watching real life even though too much happens in too short a time period for that to be the case.

This is a wandering odyssey film and features a central performance - by David Thewlis - that ranks along the best ever witnessed in cinema. How the Oscar people could have (totally) turned their back on a performance as a good as this puzzles; although the film and actor won prizes in Cannes and New York.

This is the first film I have ever seen that takes on sexual coercion in a head on fashion. People that have put themselves in a chemical or social situation where someone has something over them. The greasy upper crust landlord (Greg Cruttwell) might seem over-the-top to many but I know a few people actually like that!

(For the record his actions would be deemed illegal in real life - if you have seen the film.)

What happens to the on-screen people the day after this film ends? Has anything really changed? For Johnny - our central anti-hero - it will be just another day to duck and dive, avoid all work and wind people up using his extensive back reading.

This is one of my favourite films. I don't think that you can necessarily call it realistic. Johnny in particular seems to be one of those characters that you sometimes see in psychological dramas in film, theatre and literature who embodies too many extreme characteristics in his mode of living and his thought processes and experiences too many hyperintense situations in the short timescale of the film's action to be wholly believable. So you probably won't meet a cynical, sharply witty and intelligent and cruel f**k-up quite like that even from Manchester. But I don't think that that detracts from the film as some of the other commenters seem to feel - I don't mind a bit of staginess! David Thewlis's performance fills me with awe. His speech, his facial expressions, the way he moves and holds his body are electrifying. He is an incredibly damaged character who uses his (sometimes inhumanly) sharp wit and intelligence to cruelly torment and exploit those around him instead of trying to use his obvious gifts in a more positive way to help himself and the other human flotsam that he encounters. For all his strength of will and powers of endurance, he is weak because he revels in his nihilism and his desire to crush other unfortunates. He could never have a genuinely open mutual compassionate relationship with another human being. But thanks to the brilliance of DT he becomes one of the most magnetic screen characters ever. I love Mike Leigh and I love David Thewlis (he always plays unusual characters but not often misanthropes - the man is a great actor). I love this movie. 'Nuff said.