Happy-Go-Lucky

[KLAXXON]

Poppy (Sally Hawkins) is an irrepressibly cheerful primary school teacher who won't let anyone or anything get her down. Even when her bicycle, which she so happily rides through the busy streets of London is stolen, her first thought is only: "I didn't even get a chance to say goodbye." Living with her flat mate Zoe (Alexis Zergerman), Poppy has a gift for making the most of life. Determined to learn to drive, she finds herself matched with Scott (Eddie Marsan), an uptight driving instructor who is everything she is not. From Director Mike Leigh (Vera Drake) HAPPY-GO-LUCKY is a laugh-out-loud comedy about having fun, looking for love and getting on with life.





Poppy (Hawkins) is a London primary school teacher. After her bike is stolen she gets driving lessons, but her teacher, Scott (Marsan), turns out to be a bit of a nut. She begins learning flamenco. One of the kids in her class has problems at home. And all the while, she barely stops smiling…





It is a fairly common misconception that crying on demand is one of the hardest things an actor can do. It’s not. Sneezing convincingly, for example, is tougher. As is laughing. And by that we mean proper laughing - laughing with your eyes, to paraphrase Roald Dahl, rather than with your mouth. In this sense, Mike Leigh regular Sally Hawkins delivers a remarkable performance as Poppy, a woman who greets every situation with a smile, a joke and a guffaw, as if she’s hooked on nitrous oxide.

Towards the end of the film, her flatmate advises her, “You can’t make everyone ’appy all the time,” to which she replies, “Yeah, but there’s no ’arm in tryin’.” Some would disagree, and that’s the driving dynamic of Leigh’s latest film: in an insular, insecure urban society, what do we make of someone like Poppy? She certainly challenges the assumptions of those who encounter her, from a snooty bookshop clerk to unhinged driving instructor Scott (Eddie Marsan), to us, the audience. She’s not stupid, she’s not naive, she’s not even self-deceptive - we uncover no dark soul broiling beneath the gleaming smile and dizzy mannerisms.

You spend the movie half-expecting Leigh to punish her for her persistent frivolity, yet while his dramatic constructions certainly test Poppy’s bounce (including one unnecessary extended scene where she encounters a mad tramp), it’s less a case of the world trying to grind her down than her trying, for want of a better phrase, to grind the world up. This is most evident in the driving lesson episodes, with Marsan’s invective-spitting misanthrope set up as the hate-mongering yang to Poppy’s mirthful ying. Here, Marsan - who must be tiring of playing misfits - comes close to unbalancing the film, Scott’s beetroot-faced rants tainting the naturalism somewhat.

Still, those who only know Leigh by his (unfair) reputation as a miserablist might be surprised to find that ultimately, Happy-Go-Lucky is a genuine feelgood film. There’s a good chance that you’ll wish you could face all life’s tribulations Poppy-style. You might even be tempted to give it a go — after all, there’s no ’arm in tryin’.



Mike Leigh draws a bravura performance out of Sally Hawkins, and she in return makes Poppy one of Leigh’s best characters yet - up there with the likes of Vera Drake or Beverly from Abigail’s Party.







Sally Hawkins ...  Poppy
Elliot Cowan ...  Bookseller
Alexis Zegerman ...  Zoe
Andrea Riseborough ...  Dawn
Sinead Matthews ...  Alice
Kate O'Flynn ...  Suzy
Sarah Niles ...  Tash
Eddie Marsan ...  Scott
Joseph Kloska ...  Suzy's Boyfriend
Sylvestra Le Touzel ...  Heather
Anna Reynolds ...  Receptionist
Nonso Anozie ...  Ezra
Trevor Cooper ...  Patient
Karina Fernandez ...  Flamenco Teacher
Philip Arditti ...  Flamenco Student





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