All or Nothing (film)
| All or Nothing | |
|---|---|
 British DVD cover | |
| Directed by | Mike Leigh |
| Written by | Mike Leigh |
| Produced by | Simon Channing Williams |
| Starring | Timothy Spall Lesley Manville |
| Edited by | Lesley Walker |
| Music by | Andrew Dickson |
Production companies | |
| Distributed by | UGC Films (UK) United Artists (USA) |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 128 minutes |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $9 million |
| Box office | $2.8 million[1] |
All or Nothing is a 2002 British drama film written and directed by Mike Leigh. Like much of Leigh's work, the film is set in present-day London, and depicts three working-class families and their everyday lives.
Plot summary
The film begins with a day nearing end. Rachel, the daughter in the first family, is shown working in a nursing home. Phil, her father, is shown driving people around in his minicab. Penny, Rachel's mother, is shown working as a cashier at Safeway store alongside Maureen, the mother in the second family. When Penny leaves work, she cycles home to find her eighteen-year-old son Rory in a fight with a local boy for taking his football.
Rory is a lazy, obese, ill-mannered teenager who stays home all day and doesn't work. Complications with Rory's obesity arise when after an altercation with a gang of youths playing "Piggy in the Middle", he ultimately runs out of breath, begins to hyperventilate and is hospitalised after suffering a heart attack.
The second family consists of Maureen, another cashier at Safeway, and her daughter Donna, a waitress at a cafe. A brief storyline involves a dispute with Donna's boyfriend, Jason. Donna finds herself pregnant, despite being on the pill, and this leads to a heated argument among the three characters.
The third family consists of Ron, who is a minicab driver along with Phil, his unemployed teenage daughter Samantha, and his wife Carol, an unemployed alcoholic who is always shown intoxicated.
The film does not have one single storyline, but several. All are leading up to the climax, when Rory suffers a heart attack, leading to a relationship crisis in the first family.
Cast
- Timothy Spall as Phil
- Lesley Manville as Penny
- James Corden as Rory
- Alison Garland as Rachel
- Ruth Sheen as Maureen
- Marion Bailey as Carol
- Paul Jesson as Ron
- Sam Kelly as Sid
- Kathryn Hunter as Cécile
- Sally Hawkins as Samantha
- Helen Coker as Donna
- Daniel Mays as Jason
- Ben Crompton as Craig
- Robert Wilfort as Dr. Simon Griffith
- Gary McDonald as Neville
- Dorothy Atkinson as A Silent Passenger
Film locations
Dungeness in Kent was used as a film location for the scene where Phil visits the coast to contemplate his problems.[2]
Reception
It was well received by critics and audiences alike, receiving an 83% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 89 reviews, with an average rating of 7.1/10. The critical consensus states that "All or Nothing's depiction of the working-class can be depressingly bleak, but the performances are wonderfully true to life." The film holds an average B+ grade on Yahoo! Movies.
Awards
The film won the London Film Critics Circle Award for Best British Film of the Year, and Mike Leigh was nominated for Best Director at the European Film Awards. The film was also nominated for the Palme d'Or at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival.[3]
References
- ^ "All or Nothing (2002) - Box Office Mojo". www.boxofficemojo.com.
- ^ Kent Film Office. "Kent Film Office All or Nothing Article".
- ^ "Festival de Cannes: All or Nothing". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 24 October 2009.