Love + Hate

A terrific debut from Dominic Savage, this gritty drama set in North England deals with racism and love, lust and hate. The beautiful Samina Awan plays 17-year-old Pakistan girl Naseema who starts working at a lonely wallpaper shop and quickly falls for Adam (Tom Hudso), a racist who finds himself conflicted, especially in contrast to his racist, binge drinking friends and older brother.

There are other characters involved and sometimes the supporting characters (Naseema's friend going out with her brother, whose own work college is the girl's father) hog a bit of the screen, but the central love story is compelling enough and very satisfying.

It is flawed, and the ending can't decide if it's feel-good or feel-bad, but the story resonates powerfully, even if the accents don't.

Set in a Northern town where white racism is prevalent and Muslim youth are torn between their contemporary world and their parent's traditional faith. Adam and Naseem are typical of their sections of the community but are dissatisfied with their lifestyles. They start a relationship which predictably challenges what is regarded as acceptable by their peers and parents.

Although there is nothing new in this film it does a good job of exposing complex issues within contemporary Britain. The acting is brilliant and brings alive the familiar themes of intolerance, revenge, teenage sexuality and love in multicultural Britain. The story perhaps relies a little too much on coincidences.

First and foremost, this is only my 2nd post ever and I've been using this website for well over 2 years now. My point is, something has to stir me up, to write a comment.

Well this film has, and more to the point some of the negative posts by others. Firstly, its not a classic. Secondly and more importantly, its nowhere near belonging on the scrap heap either. As the other posts have explained the outline of the plot, I refrain from repeating. What I will say though, is how surprised I was at how good I felt this film was upon its conclusion. I've watched so many films over the years, and have seen nearly all of the films in the top 250 on this website. Like I've said, its not a classic, but the film has a really good effort at offering a powerful and compelling story about issues in modern Britain. Comments made about the standard of the acting, are at the very least harsh, and seem to miss the point. The actors are indeed supposed to be young adults from Blackburn starting life out in the working world. It would be inappropriate to be acted with the grandeur of a Hollywood line-up. They give it a really good go and certain scenes are to a degree shocking and indeed quite moving.

No, its not a tear-jerker. It just has a powerful, if not slightly plagiarised plot, leaving you feeling better for indulging in its 86 minutes of worthwhile subject. Its a good British film you should watch with an open mind and an hour and a half of uninterrupted time.

The dialog delivery was awkward and unnatural. I get the feeling that they were trying to make it sound more "natural" with the actors stepping on each other's lines, but it just sounds like they don't know their parts so well. It could just be bad acting. Maybe the actors were attempting to ad-lib. I don't know.

The writer has low expectations for the audience's understanding and feels he has to spell everything out in the dialog. The racist kids walks out of the back room, it's pretty obvious that it's because he doesn't like the new Muslim girl. The Muslim girl says "Why did he just leave like that without saying anything?". Duh.

And I can't understand most of what the two chav prostitutes are saying. That's what you are, by the way, when you get all dressed up to sit by the side of the road waiting to get picked up for sex with random guys in their cars. A hooker.

It's not a terrible film, but it's not exactly an original story either.

To judge by the comments here, it's one of those films you indeed either love or hate. I loved it; to me, coming from the north of England, the characters and dialogue were utterly convincing and compelling. (Maybe because the decent, fair-minded chap who ran the wallpaper shop reminded me of my Dad... unfortunately some of the other characters, with their odious and ignorant views, I recognised too.)

To me, the only problem was the over-reliance on coincidences (oh, so Greek drama). But I liked the fact that many of the expected clichés were avoided.

So, Hollywood it ain't. If you like your films smartly scripted and smoothly acted, you may well hate the Loach-style rough edges.

But for me, this raw and bluntly honest film was one of the most powerful pieces of cinema of the year. And, actually, excellently acted. Throughout I kept saying, that's what it's like. That's just what they do. That's exactly what they say. And, by gosh, I wish it wasn't.