Face, 1997, United Kingdom, Dir. Antonia Bird (Damon Albarn)
Best remembered for containing Damon Albarn’s one film acting performance, as wet-behind-the-ears aspiring gangster Jason, this week’s Pop Screen argues that Antonia Bird’s 1997 movie Face deserves more credit. A British gangster movie made in that brief moment before Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels inspired every screenwriter in the country to write a gangster movie, it’s a brutal postmortem on eighteen years of Conservative government disguised as a brutal heist-gone-wrong thriller.
Those unexpected political grace notes – including an eyebrow-raising opening cameo! – are among the topics discussed by Mark and Graham in this episode, along with the film’s savvy use of genre icon Ray Winstone, the rise and fall of the Blair-era London gangland thriller, and the baptism of fire Albarn received at the hands of Quadrophenia’s Phil Davis. We also praise the late, much-missed Bird and her writer Ronan Bennett, and if that sounds like we’ve not left much room for discussion of Blur…
…well, you’re right, but that’s a fine reason to donate to our Patreon where we’re about to release an exclusive episode about the band’s 1993 documentary Starshaped. It’s the latest in our monthly Pop Screen bonuses; we’ve also just put out an episode of our other exclusive podcast Director’s Lottery about Robert Wise, covering his films The Day the Earth Stood Still and Odds Against Tomorrow. For more information about these and other exclusives, follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
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