The Long Tomorrow (1955)

This novel from the Library of America ‘50s SF box is by Leigh Brackett. I barely know the name but I see she has a big reputation and, indeed, she is a good writer who can construct a novel (as opposed to all the fix-ups, more common than I knew). The Long Tomorrow features a postapocalyptic scene, set in the US after “the Destruction”—presumably an all-out nuclear war. The idea is summed up in the “30th Amendment” to the US Constitution, which outlaws cities and sets limits on density. The Amish have risen to prominence because they know better how to survive without a lot of the modern technology that has been lost. Religion has returned to prominence along with biblical public policy like stoning as a means of execution. Two boys from a small town (well, small towns is all we’ve got here) are curious about science and knowledge. They want to get to a perhaps mythical place called Barterstown, which honors knowledge according to the legends and rumors. I can’t help seeing a lot of this through the frame of now, and these religious anti-city anti-science folks in charge inevitably made me think of trumpism. The boys eventually escape and make the long journey to Barterstown, which of course isn’t at all what they thought it would be. I should probably shut up now, because I’ve already spoiled Brackett’s work to keep it uncertain in the first half whether Barterstown even really exists. The thing I like best about The Long Tomorrow is simply how well done it is. There are probably better dystopias involving religion, but this certainly merits a look if that’s your thing (Harlan Ellison, say, or Margaret Atwood). It’s not mine so much. My sympathies, here and elsewhere, straddle the religious and antireligious. In this day and age I would have to count myself, in a general sort of way, on Team Antireligious. The religious folks here are pigheaded and can be brutal but they’re not all bad, much as the Barterstown residents are sadly flawed too. Hard to know exactly where, between these two sides, that my sympathies would lie. The careful ambiguity counts as a good thing by my lights. The Long Tomorrow was good enough I’m inclined to track down some more by Brackett,

In case the library is closed due to pandemic, which is over. (Library of America)

Happy-Go-Lucky (2008)

UK, 118 minutes

Director/writer: Mike Leigh

Photography: Dick Pope

Music: Gary Yershon

Editor: Jim Clark

Cast: Sally Hawkins, Eddie Marsan, Alexis Zegerman, Samuel Roukin, Karina Fernandez, Kate O'Flynn, Stanley Townsend

I was surprised to find this picture might have a higher profile than I thought or remembered. It got a bunch of awards and nominations and landed on a dozen or more year-end top-10 lists by a range of critics. Notable contrarian Armond White called it the best movie of that year (not necessarily an endorsement). And then, on director and screenwriter Mike Leigh's IMDb page, it shows up second in his "Known For" tally, just behind Secrets & Lies and ahead of Naked and Another Year. That latter was another surprise for me as I have also thought of Another Year as another overlooked gem. Also, yes, I would say Secrets & Lies is probably his best, but I haven't seen it in a while.

It's tempting to call Happy-Go-Lucky the self-conscious inverse of Naked. Where Naked is a portrait of a pathologically miserable human being, Happy-Go-Lucky is similarly a character study about a pathologically cheerful person. Perhaps needless to say, because this is a Mike Leigh picture, both feature amazing central performances. Sally Hawkins is perfect as the relentlessly upbeat Poppy, a single grade-school teacher in her early 30s who hangs out with her friends in London and cracks dad jokes like nobody's business. "Bear with me," says one character. "Is there?" Poppy says. "Where is it?"

Naked (1993)

UK, 131 minutes

Director/writer: Mike Leigh

Photography: Dick Pope

Music: Andrew Dickson

Editor: Jon Gregory

Cast: David Thewlis, Lesley Sharp, Katrin Cartlidge, Greg Cruttwell, Peter Wight, Ewen Bremner, Susan Vidler, Deborah Maclaren, Gina McKee, Claire Skinner

Naked made quite a splash when it first came out in 1993, getting a lot of love at Cannes that year, but it's a movie that is easier to admire than to like. The main character, Johnny, is one of the most detestable characters I know in fiction. David Thewlis puts him over completely in an amazing performance that was the source of most of the picture's honors. Naked opens on Johnny raping a woman in the street, stealing a car, and fleeing to London to look up an old girlfriend, Louise (Lesley Sharp). She is cold to him, so he seduces her roommate Sophie (Katrin Cartlidge and an indelible accent). Johnny never stops talking and mocking. Self-destructive does not even start with this guy. He's so extreme the idea of derangement and mental illness inevitably intrudes. He is highly intellectual and freely rants conspiracy theories, many rooted in the Bible and Book of Revelations. Whether he actually believes them, or is once again just "taking the piss," is hard to tell.

Last time I looked at Naked was my third time. The first was when it was new. I was caught up in the hype and liked it reflexively. It's by director and writer Mike Leigh who knows what he is doing making a movie. The second time I liked it less—the dreary look and feel, the harping rants, Johnny's prolific bad behavior. It's a lot. This third time I came down more in the middle, partly because I knew how to set my expectations. It's basically people being beastly to each other in serial fashion, although inevitably there are some good people too in this trainwreck, plus lots of ciphers. The main problem, and it's not just Johnny, is a kind of toxic immaturity, a selfishness and smallness to most of these people that is unrelenting. A typical exchange as someone is leaving someone else's premises: "Are you coming back?" "What the fuck for?"

Another Year (2010)

UK, 129 minutes
Director/writer: Mike Leigh
Photography: Dick Pope
Music: Gary Yershon
Editor: Jon Gregory
Cast: Jim Broadbent, Ruth Sheen, Lesley Manville, Oliver Maltman, Peter Wight, David Bradley, Karina Fernandez, Imelda Staunton, Michele Austin, Martin Savage

Another Year is deceptively soft, playing at gentility, filled with amiable middle-aged conversation and activities: urban gardens, golf, getting around London, having drinks with friends, cooking, visits, reminiscing. At its center are Tom (Jim Broadbent) and Gerri (Ruth Sheen), a comfortable married middle-class couple—he is an engineer, she is a therapist at a public clinic, their son Joe (Oliver Maltman) is 30 and established in a career.

It is their friends and extended family who tell the tale. In a strange twist, the bottomless compassion and patience that Tom and Gerri bear for these unfortunates come to seem a version of Oscar Wilde's painting of Dorian Gray, as if by some devilish deal their equanimities have been drawn from those around them in exchange for naked insecurities and neurosis. For that reason, the real stars, the full freak show, of Another Year are not the front-billed Broadbent and Sheen, but more like David Bradley, Martin Savage, Peter Wight, and especially Lesley Manville, who bring so much credibility and blinking force to the wretches they play.