Lack of good storyline.

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

If you are heavily offended by the F or C word, or it's even taboo, forget about watching this film. Nil By Mouth is reality unfolding, before our very eyes. Ray Winstone gives a ferocious performance as a drug dealer ex parolee, also a heavy boozer, who likes to down a beer after a wine. Unfortunately his boozing leads to his habitual wife bashing. This time around it had devastating consequences. His long suffering wife, (Kathy Burke in a standout performance) has a heroin addict for brother, also an ex parolee (Charlie Creed Miles, who adds another A grade performance to this film). He's totally believable, especially in his desperation for another fix, mostly in scenes where he's having heated arguments with his mother (Oldman's real life sister). The montage song for this, I loved by the way. Nil by Mouth is not a plot driven movie. It's real life, and a kind of situation movie too. It's a movie based on Oldman's background, as a kid, growing up. Ray Winstone, who's got his career back on track after this 1998 film, has become one of my favorite actors. I'm glad he did too, as cinema has missed a movie great for far too long. The first half an hour has Winstone, and his best mate (Jamie Foreman) spinning gags and telling stories that you become involved with, one especially involving one of their mad crim mates. Even later on, after Winstone has gone berserk, tearing up his place, as if a buffalo charged through it, we have a scene with him spilling his sad childhood, about fatherly neglect onto his mate (Jamie Foreman), a patient and supportive listener, as shown in some other scenes as well, the kind of mate, everyone should have. The constant use of expletives, and I use constant with a capital C was true to fact from Oldman's perspective from what I heard. I've never heard a higher use of curses in film. At times the constant expletives become too much, but they're in those intense explosive scenes, Winstone's ones that work for it so darn well. E.g. like where he's trying to get his daughter back, causing a ruckus with other neighbors. You could see this happening anywhere. In life, we have our bad times and good times, one good time, clearly reflected in the last scene where everything's back on an evening keel, and Winstone's re-united with wife and daughter. It's cute, this scene with him, snuggling his daughter. These are moments you cherish and hold onto. It's one of the movie's best scenes. Another one is him, play fighting with his wife's mother, a tough steadfast oldie, who puts up her dukes. She doesn't have a bad singing voice to match, either, we discover. The other scene that's particularly impressive, is Winstone alone, liquored up, calling the wife. When he hangs up, he resumes a conversation, picking up his handset phone again, and banging it many times against it's receiver, while delivering an apologetic conversation, as if his wife (who's bashed face looks like a steamroller went over it) is there. This is followed by him defending himself, blaming the wife. This guy has really been torn in some of the most believable acting I've ever seen. We actually can't help feeling sorry for the guy, in spite of the consequences, prior to his violent acts, one murderous, which is most unforgiving. Winstone is one of those actors, like Ray Liotta, who can play rage and anger with brilliant believability, and also be threatening. Winstone's character is someone you wouldn't want get on their bad side, or meet in a dark alley. But it's Burke as the abused wife that rises above the other performances. That Kevin and Perry crap doesn't do her justice. The most effective NBM moment is near the start, during one of those stories, where Burke in the background, literally shakes for a couple of seconds while rigidly holding a coffee, as if the F words have become all too much, and too, this abuse has been going on for much too long. The bashing scene, where we see Ray's proud shirtless body, as he pounds on his wifee, who by the way is pregnant, will disturb some I imagine as it kind of did me, as he shouts the C word in a succession. One more scene I have to mention, cause I love it, is Charlie Creed Mile's friend, who looks Maori, his arm sporting all of this stuff, scrawled onto it, as if his arm's a blackboard. He recites that trademark Hopper scene in Apocalypse Now, in shouting form. Scenes like this are truly unforgettable. How Oldman got this project off the ground, in terms of script is an oddity. It's rough raw dialogue hardly leaves room for much else, although some of it, true to fact, hits you right in the nose. It's almost as if the actors ad-libbed. I would of loved to have read the written product. But there's no denying that this is a good movie, as it is an important one. Garry Oldman's only written and directed film. Funnily, Winstone went on to star in another controversial film, The War Zone, which was fine actor, Tim Roth's only directed film. Incidentally, some trivia: Nil By Mouth hit Adelaide cinemas, on May 21'st, Oldman's 40th birthday. Also the movie was brought back by public demand. Excellent, and in one sense, a sheer masterpiece, that MUST be viewed.

Don't be mistaken, this is not another piece of British scuzzploitation, far from it. Although it appears comparable on face value, it certainly isn't within the lowly sphere of Rise of the Footsoldier or The Football Factory. The film concentrates on Ray (Ray Winstone), his wife Valerie (Kathy Burke), mother-in-law Janet (Laila Morse), brother-in-law Billy (Charlie Creed-Miles) and best friend Mark (Jamie Foreman). Winstone and Burke are both tremendous, they share scenes – one in particular – of harrowing intensity. Ray is a man consumed with rage and jealousy, emotions that have most likely followed him throughout his sorry existence. To summarise the film's premise/narrative, it is essentially a depiction of the causes and consequences of his latest brutal outburst. Winstone's performance is a piece of realist brilliance; some may say he's one-dimensional, but he really is a rather good actor. Nil By Mouth's portrait of a deeply violent, self-destructive man is one of the most frightening and brutal I've ever seen, more so than even Robert De Niro in Raging Bull (1980).In a film of hapless victims, Ray's wife Valerie suffers to the greatest extent. Burke portrays a woman completely servile to her husband who unfortunately enables his tyranny by interminably tolerating his wayward, selfish behaviour. It is Kathy Burke's moments that are the most moving, chiefly a scene where she desperately tells a white-lie: it's genuinely upsetting.Another interesting character is Mark. Foreman's character is a vapid parasite, a little abettor of a man who's codependent on Ray and his tempestuous emotions.The dialogue of Gary Oldman's script has ample profanity, and I really mean ample, with a combination of in excess of 80 c*nts and 428 f*cks, it's the most profane film ever made. Amongst all the cockney bellowing however are monologues of real poignancy, most notably one delivered by Winstone in which he speaks of his awful, putrid father, reminding the viewer that the misery they've witnessed is a toxic generational cycle that's largely inescapable. One criticism of Oldman's script/narrative is that it is a trifle convoluted at 128 minutes, there are a few scenes that contribute little or nothing to the film, including an annoying Apocalypse Now re- enactment and an annoying shouty scene in a dry cleaners (both scenes feature this repellent little tattooed man with a grating hoarse voice.)The film is rightfully spared of romanticism, it's completely devoid of poetic licence, what you see is pure, candid realism. Ironically, the film isn't pure at all, it's gritty and unrestrained in its depiction of violence and vulgarity; one moment being particularly horrifying. To criticise the film for being 'unfocused' is missing the point. To me, it was an almost non- linear insight into the human condition, a film woven from the personal experiences of Gary Oldman and delivered with the utmost conviction from Burke, Winstone and indeed the whole cast.85%www.hawkensian.com

Nil By Mouth is not a film made for enjoyment - or even entertainment, for that matter. This is a raw, gritty insight into the very real world of alcoholism, abusive relationships, and general dysfunction.In his directorial debut, Gary Oldman makes no attempt to sugarcoat his perception of life in South London. Utilizing rough dialogue, claustrophobic camera work, grim lighting, and a constant presence of violent tension, he has instead created a cathartic and uncomfortably honest atmosphere from start to finish.The entire cast is pitch-perfect for what this film is trying to achieve- that being to divert from the typical Hollywood 'art imitating life' and into the real, unglamorous, and painful lives that thousands of people world-wide have to face every day. They are not in this film for their looks or reputation, but rather for their ability to capture what it is to be human in broken circumstances. They don't make practiced faces into the camera. They don't spew out Oscar-ready monologues. They don't shed the single, pretty tear down the cheek. No. They forget about the camera's presence and do exactly what you and I would do in their given situations, making them better actors than most A-Listers that you'll see today.Nil By Mouth is a thoroughly unpleasant 2 hour watch, and it will certainly be difficult to sit through. Never-the-less, it is a film that needs to be watched. While film is a great medium for escaping our daily hardships, it can also be used as a means of opening our eyes to the crueler side of life - the life of our neighbours, our friends, or even ourselves. Oldman has achieved this without mercy or restraint, and as a result has created a masterful study of every-day horrors.

I'm a sucker for Cockney films. I've got a few Cockney pals & I'm fascinated by their accent, slang & wit, but this is not Lock, Stock & Two Smoking, mate. Not even close.I first watched Nil by Mouth several years ago under the erroneous impression Gary Oldman acted in it; I disliked it & soon put it from my mind. Recently though, a friend talked me into seeing it again & I have to concur, it really is an intelligently conceived & superbly crafted film. It's totally & utterly real in every detail, from the mists of rage-blown spit during Ray's outbursts to the ambient pub noise & people talking over one another that semi-obscures the dialog. (English subtitles would have come in handy here.) But the very realism that makes this film so brilliant is what makes it so excruciating to watch.First-rate performances are turned in by Charlie Creed-Miles, whose Billie is so spot-on you never really notice the acting; by the ever-beguiling Steve Sweeney as Billie's geezer mate; & by Laila Morse as the quietly suffering mother of a junkie son & an abused daughter. But all of these are overshadowed by the extraordinary performances of Ray Winstone & Kathy Burke.Nil by Mouth is about family — & dysfunctional doesn't begin to describe it. Young Billie, who at first seems be shaping as the main character, serves more as a foil for the rest of the family than anything else. He leads the life of a junkie, scamming & scheming, begging & stealing, jones-ing & winding up in one jam after another. Predictable. Ray, on the other hand — in a tour-de-force portrayal by Ray Winstone — is so full of brooding violence barely held in check as to be totally unpredictable. We never learn what it is he does for a living, but we can make an educated guess that it's nothing on the up-&-up. The only good times Ray knows center on pubs & lap-dancers & even then he seems on the verge of rage half the time.Kathy Burke, in her quietly understated role as Ray's wife Val, is almost equally brilliant, drawing on hidden strength you never suspected she had after a horrific beating at Ray's hands. Perhaps the most moving scene in the film is when she starts dancing a bit at her grandmother's flat where she's recuperating. She dances clumsily, haltingly — clearly still in a lot of pain — but she embraces this life-affirming activity nonetheless, even assuaging the fears & anguish her gram feels for her by drawing her into the dance.Ray's chillingly restrained drug- & alcohol-induced psychopathy as he wakes Val from a sound sleep to interrogate her & his total savagery when he assaults her are outright terrifying. But his utter breakdown afterwards, the staggering lunacy of it, the verbal rehearsal to an empty flat of all his apologies & excuses, the glossing-over, the utter lack of remorse, his besotted attempts to woo her back over a phone he's too drunk to even hold on to... these add up to one of the best acting performances I've ever witnessed. His later revelations about his childhood as he sits drinking with his mate Mark leave you with a tinge of... not sympathy — you can't muster sympathy for an animal like that — but perhaps an inkling of insight into the tortured soul that makes him who he is.And this, I think, is the focus of the film, the unbroken chain of binge-drinking & father-to-son brutalization that breeds ever more of the same for all involved. In its realism, the only film I can compare it to is Martin Scorcese's Mean Streets, but Mean Streets never cut this deep.The ending is left open to interpretation. This isn't Hollywood; there never was a plot, nothing's neatly resolved, no comforting closure here. Is this a temporary truce or is it worse, a genuine rapprochement? It's impossible for the viewer to forgive Ray his brutality, and yet you're left with the sinking feeling that Val will & the cycle will go on.