A Room for Romeo Brass

Two boys next door to each other on the edge of Nottingham: Romeo, and Gavin, who has a back condition. After a fight in the park a grown man named Morell protects them and becomes their friend. Morell is lonely, odd, and in love with Romeo's sister. The man who seems entertaining at first steadily becomes something else. Shane Meadows directs, from a screenplay written with his childhood friend Paul Fraser, drawn from their own childhood. Andrew Shim plays Romeo, Ben Marshall plays Gavin, Paddy Considine plays Morell. Considine entered film with this. Meadows knew him from college and cast a friend with no acting experience at all; the result became one of the most discussed debut performances in British cinema and started his career. The first half is comedy: boys talking, neighbourhood jokes, scenes that feel improvised. Then the register slides, and you understand what Morell is at the same moment the children do. That transition is the film's real achievement. Meadows later became known for This Is England, which uses the same streets, the same method and some of the same cast. Who it is for: viewers who like British realism and films built on childhood. Who it is not for: the tonal shift is hard for some, and the film never fully explains anyone.