The opening screams agitprop – titles flashing white and red as a car crash happens off-screen – but you’d be hard pressed to say for certain what this movie’s agitated about. Opening in December 1979, Stephen Frears’ Bloody Kids is like a glimpse of another era: post-punk, pre-’80s Thatcherism. Penned by Stephen Poliakoff, it makes Britain alien. Gary Holten’s joyriding sociopath rails against boredom, while Jack Douglas’ rozzer wearies of it all (“This is no job for a grown man”). The brooding atmosphere builds into an apocalyptic Munchian scream that’s as enigmatic as it is genuinely haunting.
Read the full Bloody Kids review
Comments