Any film shot in locations with names like Hamlet Towers, Barking, and Mucking Flats can't be all bad, even if it's an inexpensive, small-scale slice of working-class life seen from the point of view of a maladjusted fifteen-year-old girl.
Kate Jarvis is Mia. She lives at home with her flamboyantly sexy Mom and her foul-mouthed little sister. Mia is at that stage of development that's cynical, sullen, and insulting, so she's been thrown out of school and is waiting for admittance to a kind of reform school. Meanwhile she has hopes of getting a professional job or otherwise achieving fame as a pop dancer who does break steps.
Her mother brings home a handsome, youngish boyfriend -- Michael Fassbender. Fassbender seems like a nice-enough guy. He's quiet, generous, friendly. But Mia, her hormones aboil, is silently attracted to him -- at least we can assume so. It's never very explicit. One night when Mom is "passed out", Mia demonstrates her slinky dance for him and he responds like any normal man. He's all over her. But he doesn't force her because he doesn't have to.
The incident leaves Fassbender filled with guilt and he moves out. Mia goes to considerable trouble tracking him down and comes close to doing him and herself real harm until she manages to shrug the affair off.
I can believe this was written and directed by a woman because it's all about the texture of relationships and the knotty problems they present us with. I don't mean that as a negative comment. The film may reflect female interests more than male ones but it's refreshing to see a movie about people who are screwed up but could be found on the sidewalk. If this had been directed by a man about a troubled adolescent boy it might have been full of guns, bashings, and busted snot lockers.
At that, though, it moves a little sluggishly. We're interested in the characters but the movie does go on, and it could have used some pruning in the editing room. "War and Peace" needs to be long. "Fish Tank" could have been shorter.
The movie belongs to Katie Jarvis and she's not bad. She has a small frame and although she's thoroughly nubile she retains the flat-breasted gangliness of her growth spurt. She's moderately attractive and it's a nice touch that once in a while the script gives her a chance to get drunk and show some happiness. It gives her a chance to demonstrate that there's more than one note on her instrument. What she lacks -- what I presume she is SUPPOSED to lack -- is feminine grace. She's not a dancer. Her moves are clumsy and inept, and when she doesn't get the job, it's just another disappointing childhood fantasy that she must come to terms with.
It's not a masterpiece. It's not that ambitious. But it's a neat and competent job, though it does need some cutting.
Kate Jarvis is Mia. She lives at home with her flamboyantly sexy Mom and her foul-mouthed little sister. Mia is at that stage of development that's cynical, sullen, and insulting, so she's been thrown out of school and is waiting for admittance to a kind of reform school. Meanwhile she has hopes of getting a professional job or otherwise achieving fame as a pop dancer who does break steps.
Her mother brings home a handsome, youngish boyfriend -- Michael Fassbender. Fassbender seems like a nice-enough guy. He's quiet, generous, friendly. But Mia, her hormones aboil, is silently attracted to him -- at least we can assume so. It's never very explicit. One night when Mom is "passed out", Mia demonstrates her slinky dance for him and he responds like any normal man. He's all over her. But he doesn't force her because he doesn't have to.
The incident leaves Fassbender filled with guilt and he moves out. Mia goes to considerable trouble tracking him down and comes close to doing him and herself real harm until she manages to shrug the affair off.
I can believe this was written and directed by a woman because it's all about the texture of relationships and the knotty problems they present us with. I don't mean that as a negative comment. The film may reflect female interests more than male ones but it's refreshing to see a movie about people who are screwed up but could be found on the sidewalk. If this had been directed by a man about a troubled adolescent boy it might have been full of guns, bashings, and busted snot lockers.
At that, though, it moves a little sluggishly. We're interested in the characters but the movie does go on, and it could have used some pruning in the editing room. "War and Peace" needs to be long. "Fish Tank" could have been shorter.
The movie belongs to Katie Jarvis and she's not bad. She has a small frame and although she's thoroughly nubile she retains the flat-breasted gangliness of her growth spurt. She's moderately attractive and it's a nice touch that once in a while the script gives her a chance to get drunk and show some happiness. It gives her a chance to demonstrate that there's more than one note on her instrument. What she lacks -- what I presume she is SUPPOSED to lack -- is feminine grace. She's not a dancer. Her moves are clumsy and inept, and when she doesn't get the job, it's just another disappointing childhood fantasy that she must come to terms with.
It's not a masterpiece. It's not that ambitious. But it's a neat and competent job, though it does need some cutting.