Skinheads: Neo-Nazis or rebels?

British film separates youthful angst from ignorance

William O’Donnell, staff

In the vein of such films as American History X and Romper Stomper (its Australian equivalent) comes This is England, another tale of youth being drawn into the bravado of skinhead culture. Set (obviously) in England, the film is based up on the director’s personal experiences during the Falklands War.

The most important deviation from the focus of the other two films mentioned is that This is England deals heavily with the difference between racist and non-racist skinhead (these days often the subcultures are simply split between “skinheads” and “sharps”) instead of purely neo-Nazi gangs. The film starts out like a coming-of-age tale for our main character, Sean (Thomas Turgoose), who finds friendship with some rebellious but warm-hearted skinheads. The plot shifts when a former friend of the group and now member of the National Front (an English white-nationalist political party) returns from a stint in prison to recruit his old friends for his new, more hostile and prejudiced cause.

The original group’s leader, Woody (played by Joe Gilgun), encouraged so much love and camaraderie that it felt almost too good to be true. Of course it was, otherwise the film would have no conflict. The new leader, Combo (Stephen Graham), leads the few members who stay on into a downward spiral that ultimately reveals the ignorance, rage and madness that drives the extremists of any “white power” movement.

The characters are developed at a very brisk pace but the script is just sharp enough that nothing much is left behind. Besides, there are several well-crafted moments of tension that give ample pauses to the pacing. These pauses are not a time to breathe, but to hold one’s breath and take a long, hard look at the possible dissention of a young person’s mind, body and soul into something that is never as rational as it professes to be.

It is interesting to see one character, Combo, inspire just as much fear in a racism-confused rage during the film’s climax as a whole gang of neo-Nazis did in American History X. This is boosted not only by the sharp writing I mentioned before but by some fine performances from the cast all around. The silence of one character can embody the epitome of rage, fear, confusion, sympathy or any number of other strong emotions, all read in the eyes and minimal gestures of the actors’ faces.

It can be very hard to understand certain youth cultures. Non-violent and non-racist sectors of “skinheads” have the major disadvantage of being largely associated with the highly publicized hate groups of the same general moniker. The enigma in this film (or perhaps the key to understanding, depending on your point of view) is the character of Milky (played by Andrew Shim), who is a black skinhead. The film notes the early ties the first skinheads had with “black” music such as ska, rocksteady, reggae and soul music. Milky exists as an example of the varying degrees of opinion that exist amongst these sorts of people and the groups they associate with about race and nationality.

Like the song by the Clash of the same name, the major points of This is England are political and cultural ones, as seen through the eyes of the outsiders — the rebels. This film is hardly an anthem for all of England’s youth but it does capture the aggravated vibe that was quite present during that time in the 1980s (at least, that is my understanding from my point of view as a North American).