The Edge of Love
UK 2008
Starring: Keira Knightley, Matthew Rhys
Director: John Maybury

Adulthood
UK 2008
Starring: Noel Clarke, Ben Drew
Director: Noel Clarke

SELECTED as the opening night film for this month’s Edinburgh Film Festival, The Edge of Love has many of the hallmarks of a successful, prestigious British movie. It’s has a period setting – in the 1940s, mainly in a London racked by the Blitz; it focuses on the life of a respected, renowned creative figure – poet, scriptwriter and legendary drinker Dylan Thomas (Matthew Rhys); it stars Keira Knightley – as Thomas’s childhood friend and lifelong soul-mate Vera, plus Sienna Miller as his independent-minded wife Caitlin; it’s handsomely-appointed in its attention to decor, sets, costumes and production design, and has no shortage of solid names working behind the camera, including composer Angelo Badalamenti (a frequent collaborator with David Lynch).

In addition, the story it tells is full of potential, concentrating on the Thomas’ torrid love-life, especially their friendship with Vera and her soldier husband William (Cillian Murphy) – while director John Maybury has an intriguing track-record, including Francis Bacon biopic Love is the Devil and underrated science-fiction drama The Jacket.

There’s many a slip between cup and lip, however, and for some reason The Edge of Love – for all its promising elements – fails to come together and make a satisfying, coherent whole. As scripted by Sharman McDonald (Knightley’s mother), the film never really manages to overcome the feeling that we’re peeking, somewhat pruriently, into the not-so-fascinating sexual lives of the famous and their circle. Effectively, there are only four characters on view and the film is much more interested in Caitlin and Vera than it is in either of their husbands. This is more a result, one suspects, of Knightley and Miller’s current prominence than for any sound dramaturgical factors. Kicking proceedings off with a glamorous Knightley singing in a London Underground blitz shelter, meanwhile, is doubly unfortunate, as it raises memories of both Dennis Potter and last year’s big Second World War romance Atonement – comparisons which emphatically aren’t to The Edge of Love’s advantage.

It’s disappointing to see a director such as Maybury, who is capable of wild invention and originality when given his head, on “best behaviour” here. In contrast to the uninhibited passions of his characters, he seems keen to avoid anything that might shock or disturb audiences (or BAFTA voters). Thomas himself famously raged “against the dying of the light”. This drab enterprise sees Maybury and MacDonald content to merely go gently.

With issues of inner-city youth disorder, knife-crime and gang-culture seemingly ever-present in newspaper headlines, there’s no faulting Adulthood – a gritty tale set on the meaner streets of present-day London – in terms of topicality. And Noel Clarke certainly doesn’t lack much in terms of ambition – having starred and written 2006’s Kidulthood, the 32-year-old Doctor Who graduate now also takes over directing duties (from Menhaj Huda) for this sequel. It’s just a pity, then, that at present his reach far exceeds his grasp. The film is a hyperactive but strangely plodding and paceless affair which strives so very hard to be “street” and “cutting-edge” and that it often tips over into overwrought histrionics.

Although essentially an ensemble piece, first among equals is Clarke as Sam, who – as the movie begins – is released from prison after a tough six-and-a-half-year stretch for manslaughter. Having been traumatised by his experiences inside (which we glimpse via colour-bleached flashbacks), Sam is keen to stick to the straight and narrow in the hope of obtaining something approximating to a quiet, ordinary life. These goals are stymied, however, by the tough crime-culture that he encounters in his neighbourhood and by the desire for vengeance that his victim’s friends and family harbour.

Clarke is treading very familiar turf here, as cinema has never had much shortage of tales examining the woes of reform-minded ex-convicts. Also, we’re very much used to seeing – on both big screen and small – chronicles of 21st-century urban dysfunction, especially in the capital’s rougher locales. Unfortunately Adulthood fails to ring any kind of new changes, instead relying on predictable plotting, flashy visuals. Clarke, who is no Brian De Palma, seems inordinately fond of split-screen gimmickry. His movie has a grimy aesthetic that feels both hand-me-down and often naggingly ersatz.

The script, meanwhile, is chockfull of zingy street-slang – so much so that much of it may prove impenetrable to anyone much older than its angry, bickering 20-something characters. On the plus side, it’s encouraging to see a depiction of multi-racial Britain in which race is hardly mentioned as an issue by anyone: whatever frictions arise – and plenty of them do – they’re seldom, if ever, anything to do with colour or creed.

Neil Young