Clio Barnard’s latest offering, a social-realist picture with the warmth of a hug and the lingering aftertaste of a cheap energy drink, follows five Birmingham friends staring down their 30s like a hangover they can’t shake. Adapted by Enda Walsh from Kieran Goddard’s novel, it transforms a pentaptych of consciousnesses - fancy term for five people thinking hard - into a hometown drama that channels Fellini’s I Vitelloni, but with more Deliveroo angst.
The gang reunites at a birthday party fueled by booze, weed, and coke, where the good times are laced with the sinking feeling that the party might actually be over. First among equals is Rian (Joe Cole), who used an inheritance from his late dad to strike it rich trading stock warrants online. He now owns a soulless London flat and dates a woman his friends call “Kate Middleton.” He’s miserable, obviously. His success sends ripples of existential dread through the rest: Conor (Daryl McCormack), a builder who names his firm “Dedalus” after the Greek myth architect - a nod to his dad, and a subtle reminder that Icarus crashed and burned; Shiv (Lola Petticrew), a stay-at-home mom content with her two kids, despite her husband Patrick (Anthony Boyle) being a food delivery cyclist who rants about capitalism; and Oli (Jay Lycurgo), a goofy heroin dealer who decides to reform after adopting a stray dog.
Housing is the film’s mythic center, sparking a debate: is it a social right or a maturing capital asset for the well-off? The demolition of Birmingham’s brutalist tower blocks in their childhood looms large - Oli swears he saw Satan’s face in the dust cloud. Rian and Conor’s gentrification venture, a glitzy apartment block, makes Patrick furious, but the film asks: what if Rian hadn’t gotten rich? Conor wouldn’t have his firm, Patrick wouldn’t be so bitter, and Oli’s life wouldn’t have turned around. It’s a sweet, sad film, laced with sobriety and hope - and the occasional whiff of cocaine.