Mike Leigh: Happy-Go-Lucky

[Chris Knipp]

MIKE LEIGH: HAPPY-GO-LUCKY (2008)

(From the Festival Coverage thread.)


A mellowed Mike Leigh, at 65, produces his definitive anti-miserabilist statement

Another one of Mike Leigh's remarkably fluent films made with his well-developed working method, which includes a long period of improvisation and development of back-stories during which, he pointed out at the NYFF Q&A, the actors are paid, and the characters are created and shaped, with surprises all along the way.

Poppy (the superb Sally Hawkins) is the "happy-go-lucky" protagonist, a thirty-year-old English girl who teaches elementary school and lives with Zoe (Alexis Zegerman), her roommate and pal of a decade's standing. Poppy has a wonderful, positive spirit. Am I wrong in thinking that this is particularly striking in the phlegmatic world of the English? She's no Pollyanna. She just chooses to react to things with good humor. In the opening sequence while trying to cheer up a grumpy, leaden-spirited bookstore clerk (Elliot Cowan), she gets her bicycle stolen. It disappoints her ("I didn't even get a chance to say goodbye"), but she quickly moves on and takes the bus or walks, and decides to take driving lessons.

This is the audience's basic introduction to Poppy's attitude to life. Clearly Poppy doesn't encounter sunshine whereever she goes (though this is summer in London, and the weather is nice). Leigh sees this film as his answer to his branding as a "miserabilist." It can be seen as the diametric opposite of Leigh's 1993 Naked. He wants it clear that it's his working method that's unchanging. His tone and characters are something new each time. Sally Hawkins' resolute smile sets the tone clearly here, along with her style of dress, which a writer has dubbed "garish grunge," framed on Fuji color film stock that provides opulent tones in the primary range within the bright format of Cinemascope--a new medium for Leigh.

A fateful decision, this choice of driving lessons, since it introduces Poppy to Scott (the droll, excellent Eddie Marsan), who becomes her instructor. He's phlegmatic, alright, and messed up. For a start, he's a racist who hates multiculturalism and locks the doors when he sees black people outside the car. Poppy takes the lessons as a lark, which bugs Scott enormously. He thinks her not serious, her insistence on wearking high boots particularly annoying (and no doubt provocative). In time it emerges that he is fascinated by her and even begins to stalk her. Initially it might be thought that Scott is right to be annoyed at Poppy, that her attitude in the lessons is frivolous and almost childish. But why should one adopt a grim attitude? Later it seems more that her mistake is to continue, when Scott is so moody and abusive toward her. But it is her way to give people a chance. She doesn't give up on him till he's gone way too far. Working well in the stages of successive lessons (not to mention the deft editing) Marsan is seen to provide finely modulated performance. He is only serious and a bit stiff at first; his dysfunctional tendencies emerge only gradually with each successive lesson, moving toward a very gradual crescendo that is a model of Leigh's skill with actors and his filmmaking method.

Early on there's a night of clubbing at which Poppy and the less ebullient Zoe get rather drunk before the weekend. At the suggestion of Poppy's school superior Heather (Sylvestra le Touzel), she joins a Flamenco class. The teacher (Karina Fernandez) is another skillful portrait; these brief sequences are priceless and memorable.

While wandering around at night in an unidentifiable place Poppy encounters a tramp (the remarkable Stanley Townsend). This is where Poppy's capacity for outreach is stretched the farthest. The tramp appears to be talking in gibberish; Poppy is undaunted. And he can make sense when spoken to. When she asks, "Have you had your dinner?" He quickly answers "No." When she says "Where will you sleep tonight?" He says right off "In a bed." "Of course," she remarks. Somehow a meeting of minds and spirits occurs, even as the tramp goes off to relieve himself three quarters of the way through their meeting. As can happen in Leigh's films, the outcome of this scene isn't clearcut. He said in the Q&A that it has no plot point as "in a Hollywood film." But that it's significant is indicated by the fact that when Poppy gets home to the flat, she won't tell Zoe about it and keeps the encounter to herself. While we may have felt Poppy was in danger, she never does. the meeting is a sign of her inner strength and generosity of spirit, as well as her intuition with people of all kinds. Though it stands alone, this is a central scene in the film.

Poppy hurts her back and goes to a chiropractor called Ezra (Nonzo Anozie). His laying on of hands is successful, though flamenco class throws things off again a bit.

A violent boy leads to calling in a social worker, Tim (Samuel Roukin), who asks Poppy, hitherto for some time relationship-free, to go out on a date. This works very well. They talk silly nonsense to each other at a pub--improvised stuff about eyes--that shows they click, and when they go to bed at Tim's "humble abode," that goes very well too. When Tim shows up before Poppy's next driving lesson, however, Scott explodes and the lesson turns into a tirade where he endangers them both with his emotional driving and craziness. This is the film's most violent confrontation and forces Poppy to terminate the instruction.

Leigh's turn to positivity may seem to lead us into some feel-good platitudes. But as the late David Foster Wallace said in his now famous Kenyan College commencement address, "in the day to day trenches of adult existence, banal platitudes can have a life or death importance." The only thing is this. Leigh's method leads to great richness and depth, and Happy-Go-Lucky is a joy to watch for all but the most dysfunctionally negative of cool dudes (though it could have been cut by a few minutes). But the improvisational method doesn't lead to tidy conclusions. Things end with Zoe and Poppy drifting off in a boat, chatting about life. It's the texture of individual scenes that delights, rather than overall structure. At the same time, things are rounded out with a worldview. And Leigh's finely honed collective working methods make his films world class.

[Chris Knipp]

DISCUSSION

OSCAR JUBIS: Interesting that Leigh sees Happy-Go-Lucky as "his answer to his branding as a miserabilist". He coul;d have simply brought up Topsy-Turvy or reminded those branding him of the optimistic and uplifting worldview of Life is Sweet and Secrets and Lies. Anyway, I'm not nearly as impressed by the new film as I am by the abovementioned and most other films by England's greatest director.

Half the time I found Poppy incredibly irritating. Her pestering of the library clerk in the opening sequence borders on abuse. She can't seem to understand some people want to be left alone. Her insistence on wearing boots with spiky heels when learning to drive a car with manual transmission is highly inconsiderate; a clear danger to the safety of others sharing the road. I bought into her reaction to having her bike stolen but not into her ability to learn to drive so quickly, given her attitude and said boots. The character borrows tics from protagonists of other Leigh films, mostly Katrin Cartlidge's Hannah of Career Girls. As far as the combination of comedy and pathos that seems to be Leigh's aim, I find that some of his earlier films, Grown Ups comes to mind, more seamless; more successful in general. With regards to the thread involving Poppy and Scott, I'd say the deck is a bit too stacked for it to satisfy as either comedy and drama.

I'm not denying Happy-Go-Lucky is a good film. I think you've certainly brought up most of what makes it enjoyable. Bear in mind that my comments attempt to justify why I didn't enjoy the film as much or think as highly of it as most who've written about it. This film is getting outrageously positive reviews. I do recognize the film has its share of attributes and it deserves to be seen.

Last edited by oscar jubis on 11-12-2008 at 03:43 PM

CHRIS KNIPP: There's no doubt at all that some people find Poppy insufferable. I just talked to someone who did, and who didn't like the movie. There's also no doubt at all that Mike Leigh himself loves her, and finds it hard to understand how others wouldn't ultimately do so too. I heard him say so. You might say he takes a risk. Maybe he doesn't really do cheer as well as he does gloom. However, it's a matter of how you choose to respond. I grasped immediately that Poppy's not being treated ironically and having willed myself to like her, I did. I did not find the exchange with the bookstore clerk at all as you took it. You certainly have a point that the relationship with Scott is a "deck" that's "stacked" in its favor. However, I found the improvised dialogue in the restaurant quite wonderful, and highly inventive. I haven't seen all Leigh's stuff. I saw Naked. I hated it, but I remember Thewlis vividly as being very repulsive. I don't remember Career Girls. I'm pretty sure I saw High Hopes an Life is Sweet. I do remember Secrets and Lies a little and Topsy Turvy visually and I remember All or Nothing vividly; I sat that in London with an English friend. Of course I remember Vera Drake. Over all, Leigh emerges as an amazing director, and a very distinctive one. But his methods sometimes undermine the results. I think Happy-Go-Lucky is one of his most vivid and will be very well remembered in both senses. I'm not sure a "combination of comedy and pathos " is exactly what Leigh is striving for; he actually seems--from his discussion at the screening of the scene with the homeless man--to regard Poppy as a kind of enlightened person. But I'm sure you're right also that there are lots of links between this and his other films and characters, but the implication that Poppy might be a borrowing of tics probably not be what you intended. Several other of Leigh's films might be more successful, but I think Happy-Go-Lucky's success is something you might have had more trouble seeing due to your allergy to Poppy.

[oscar jubis]

Thanks for organizing the discussion so neatly in the previous post.
I agree that Leigh seems to love Poppy and that the film doesn't treat her ironically. I'm sympathetic to the film's advancing the idea that being cheerful and optimistic is a helpful stance when dealing with life's problems (a logical consequence of Poppy being regarded as an enlightened person by the filmmaker, as you state). I tend to view some aspects of her personality as problematic, perhaps symptomatic (the need to call attention to herself and seek acknowledgement at all times, for instance). My comment about the mix of comedy and pathos refers specifically to the Poppy-Scott scenes not to the film as a whole. I do like the scene between Poppy and the homeless man which shows Poppy at her best.

Leigh is an amazing director indeed and the film was a disappointment to me only because I consider it one of his lesser efforts. Formerly expressed reservations notwithstanding, readers of this exchange should watch Happy-Go-Lucky. I believe most will be glad they did.