England Is Mine (2017)

Redundant and unnecessary.

Absolutely the worst movie.

Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

I'm a big fan of the smiths and morrissey... When I was growing up on Stretford I lived next to the iron bridge he spoke about in their songs. The film is interesting if you want to understand what it was like for morrissey growing up in his youth.... Quite possibly a lot missing from this film to really appreciate what happened during this period of his life. Its a slow moving film not a lot to really get you involved with the characters or the plot of the movie.... It began to get more exciting when moz met possibly one of the greatest guitarists ever for the second time in the film... Then the titles rolled...If your a fan of the smiths don't bother with this film you will only feel as frustrated as morrissey is with being a human.

Well I'm glad I'm not the only one that thought this movie was boring. You would think that a biography movie of the life of Morrissey, frontman of the Smiths, would be something interesting to watch but it's the exact opposite. Even if Morrissey was a shy young boy it doesn't mean you have to make a boring movie about it. If they told Jack Lowden to play as boring as possible then he did a good job, because that was spot on. If at least they would have played some decent music from The Smiths as the soundtrack it could have been a bit lesser boring, but even that was too much asking. There are some good biographies/movies about famous musicians but this one is for sure not one of them.

I can encapsulate working class Manchester of this time in one sentence: Cigarette burns in bus seats with the smell of stale urine in the air.I like what's been done here. The Smiths (& Morrissey himself) create such devotion in fans (especially those who were there at the time) that any conceived wrong foot in a film relating to that band would be gnawed upon by a multitude of bedroom martyrs; especially in this internet age.Nevertheless, what the film makers have done with England Is Mine sidesteps this problem, for they've made a film not about MORRISSEY, but rather Stephen (Steve) Morrissey - a young Mancunian man suffering from depression within in a time & area of depression; The Smiths aren't even a whiff away.It's hard to emphasis to those who didn't experience it, how gray Manchester of the 70s & early 80s was. It was stuck in a polluted puddle of red brick decay, unsure & struggling to break free from its own shadow. In many ways this film (consciously or not) reflects young Steven Morrissey against Manchester of that time. No cliché in sight.P.S. It is slighting disconcerting how much the lead looks like the English comedy actor Alan Davies in the first half of the film.

At last, a musical biopic that doesn't throw in cheap references, nor equally cheap laughs, and instead gives us a sober, realistic and not always warm character study of the formative years of one of Britain's best loved singer-songwriters. But be warned - if you have no interest in Steven Patrick Morrissey, indeed if you have a passing love for the band and aren't too bothered in learning how he came up with the lyrics that he did, then much of ENGLAND IS MINE might not do a lot for you. This film is definitely one for the proper fans, and for those of us in that position it's a real treat. Lots to love about this one. Jack Lowden might not look a lot like Morrissey but he gets across very well the sense of alienation and perpetual disappointment that surrounds our hero. He's bored and unfulfilled with every aspect of his life, feeling like there's something more out there and yet too shy and not forthcoming enough to go after it. That lack of belonging is something many young people experience - I know I did - and Morrissey is kind of the Dean of that time in life, and Lowden nails it. His friendship with Linder (fantastic Jessica Brown Findlay) shows him finding a rare kindred spirit, and he reacts to the lost chance of success he arrives at briefly with Adam Lawrence's Billy Duffy by doing what we would all like to and retreating to his bedroom.The period detail is excellent - you get the vision of late 70s/early 80s Manchester as a bit of a dive, crammed with lost souls and angry voices, from which Morrissey feels entirely apart. Lovely touches, like the cracked, single pane windows upon which rain hammers, add to to reality. The choice of musical numbers is another bonus. There are no Smiths tracks, given the tale essayed here takes place before the band was formed. Instead we get the 1960s songs that heavily influenced the group's sound, and that's a real bonus. The era before the Smiths existed really feels like another place, another time, bereft of something that they ended up filling. One nice bit of detail, the local venue that exhibits posters for an upcoming Duran Duran concert while Morrissey and Marr (Laurie Kynaston, not in it much) start hammering out the more localised and altogether grittier music and lyrics that would eventually form the Smiths, a great snatch of visual storytelling that the film stuffs in. And if you aren't interested in that, there's the gallows humour of young Mozzer to enjoy, an acerbic wit that would put people off and yet find expression in his words put to Marr's tunes.