Review: Happy-Go-Lucky (2008)

[Mark R. Leeper]

                         HAPPY-GO-LUCKY
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: The title describes Poppy, a London grade
     school teacher whose irrepressibly positive attitude
     is stronger than cast iron.  That is it.  There is
     very little plot to HAPPY-GO-LUCKY.  We just watch
     Poppy live her life and watch her keeping her sunny
     side up against high odds.  With lesser acting or
     direction Poppy could have ended up seeming like a
     candidate for Sesame Street or perhaps professional
     care.  But Poppy has more depth than that, and she
     easily gets the viewer on her side.  Director Mike
     Leigh counterbalances his last film, VERA DRAKE,
     with one that is lighter and more pleasant.
     Rating: low +2 (-4 to +4) or 7/10

There is not a lot happening in Mike Leigh's HAPPY-GO-LUCKY.  Or
perhaps there is more than meets the eye.  We follow around Poppy
(played by Sally Hawkins), who has an absolutely unalterably
positive attitude and a perpetual smile on her face.  We keep
waiting for something really nasty to happen to Poppy to wipe that
smile off her face.  After all, this is a film by Mike Leigh, who
made the tragic VERA DRAKE.  Poppy bounces off of three different
difficult people.  First there is the class bully in the third or
fourth grade class that Poppy teaches.  Second there is Poppy's
flamenco teacher (played by Karina Fernandez) for whom the soul of
the flamenco dance is rage and selfishness.  The first step of
flamenco is to stamp your feet while thinking, "MY SPACE! (Stamp.
Stamp.) MY SPACE!"

Darkest of all the dark people in Poppy's life is Steve (played by
comedian Eddie Marsan), Poppy's new driving instructor.  At age
thirty Poppy is learning to drive.  Steve is rage in human form as
he browbeats his students and shouts commands.  He has named the
three rear-view mirrors after fallen angels and shouts the names of
the angels when he wants Poppy to check the mirrors.  Poppy takes
all this in her superhuman stride.  The film is not so much a story
as a study of Poppy as she goes through her life and interacts with
difficult people, rarely losing her smile or her radiance.  On the
other hand Poppy's life includes her flat-mate Zoe (Alexis
Zegerman), a bright spot in Poppy's relationships.  When they get
together each seems to be like catnip for the other.  These may be
some of the only sequences that go awry under Leigh's direction.
Poppy and Zoe find each other a lot funnier than we find either of
them.  They seem to go into drugged-line paroxysms of laughter.

Mike Leigh seems to have had a great time writing about this woman
who uses her sunny attitude as armor against life and more
surprisingly finds that it works for her.  Sally Hawkins could be a
lot like the British equivalent of Anne Hathaway.  It takes a
certain amount of charm to keep a character like Poppy from grating
on the audience and Hawkins has a light enough touch.  Steve Marsan
is nothing but grating, but that is the idea.  In his own way he is
as good at what he does as Hawkins is at doing the opposite.

Underneath it all is the question of just how much ones attitude
shapes ones circumstances.  More than once Poppy takes risks that
the rest of us would not.  In a more noir film Poppy's behavior
might seem to be foolish.  But on balance she seems to come through
okay.  I rate HAPPY-GO-LUCKY a low +2 on the -4 to +4 scale or
7/10.  The accents make some of the dialog difficult to follow for
some of us Yanks.

Film Credits: <http://us.imdb.com/title/tt1045670/>

					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper at optonline.net
					Copyright 2008 Mark R. Leeper