London Road

I found this startling at the beginning - a musical about the impact on a community of five serial murders, consisting of dialogue taken from media interviews conducted with neighbours of the accused murderer. But as the film progressed I became intrigued and, quite surprisingly, moved by this unusual documentary. The actors (especially Olivia Coleman) got the lilt of the original dialogue just right, and the music brilliantly melded the rhythm and innate musicality of the language into a diverse range of songs of many musical genres. Most moving, I think, was the song of the streetwalkers who had been most impacted and most sidelined in this tragedy.

I was the 1000th person to rate the film, so I see it fair that I also throw up a review. Firstly, you need to know that this film is not for everyone. Absolutely not! Don't be lured in by Tom Hardy or Olivia Colman. You should instead be lured in by the unique take on film genre and a much more 'abstract' method of telling a story.

This is a musical about a series of five horrible murders that took place on London Road. Every lyric, however, is also taken verbatim from an interview conducted with real people and you therefore get some very genuine-feeling phrases being turned into musical numbers.

This all very weird, but the chilling melodies and rhythms as well as the intense and gritty way it is sung is frightening and works wonders. The acting is also very strong, but the intense use of color (or lack thereof) in the production and costume design is what really sells the songs and thereby the film.

The story is not too captivating, and there are times when a musical motif is used a dozen times too many, but this film is definitely worth checking out if you are in the mood for watching something extremely different and bizarre.

Yes, if like me, you see this film without knowing anything about its content and presentation, you should find it astonishing. As you can see from the plot summary in IMDb above, the story is a true one, in Ipswich in Britain, where five murders occurred not that many years ago. These events were then taken up by the National Theatre, and now as a film. There are a wide range of characters in the street (London Road) and they all have their own words used to make the dialogue. However, it is the presentation and delivery of the story that makes this film so riveting. My only reservations were the handling of two of the central characters which seemed a little far-fetched, but these are minor quibbles in a film which will be very differently delivered on the screen from what anyone would expect. Some of the imagery in the crowd scenes is especially noteworthy. Definitely recommended for art-house film fans, and the large crowd in Melbourne at the screening I attended seemed to be most impressed by its audacity.

Another reviewer referred to this as "astonishing." I suppose that can be taken several ways.

When I decided to watch this film I missed "musical" in the description and mistakenly assumed it was a murder docu-drama, rather than a crime docu-songfest.

I guess it could be described as innovative. It is allegedly based on a real event, the real words of those in the community, the reactions/implications of & for those in the locale affected by the murders and the subsequent investigations. As we are told repeatedly, people became suspicious of one another.

The question remains, is all of this something to sing about. The medium is the message or at least it influences how one feels about it all. For me it just seemed tedious and rather bizarre.

Overall, I liked the movie but why the hell would they put Tom Hardy's face on their main movie poster when he really isn't a main cast member. They did not let the camera show him throughput the movie, except for one very short scene and then a slight glimpse afterwards, which actually seems like a residue of a scene cut-out of the movie. To be honest, I decided to watch this movie, thinking it has such a great actor in it, so it has to be good. But sheer disappointment struck me when I realized that I had become a victim of cunning (yes, I will use such a harsh word) advertising.

Besides the Tom Hardy thing, however, the movie was quite a different one, kind of a very casual musical and I kind of liked it.