My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)

Editor's Note MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE is a highly acclaimed and beautifully rendered portrait of two boyhood friends struggling to survive in racially tense Thatcher-era Britain. Omar, a homosexual Pakistani boy living in London with his alcoholic father, lifts a chunk of drug money from another Pakistani and, with his school chum Johnny, decides to renovate a grungy laundrette. Featuring seething dialogue and visually stunning camera work, the film explores the world of modern Pakistanis trapped between two cultures in Thatcher's Britain and their white working class counterparts with no future in their own country.

	Daniel Day Lewis
	Gordon Warnecke
	Roshan Seth
	Saeed Jaffrey
	Shirley Ann Field
	Stephen Frears - Director
	Sarah Radclyffe - Producer
	Tim Bevan - Producer
	Hanif Kureishi - Writer

MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE, directed by Stephen Frears, is a highly innovative and fantastical exploration of marginalized cultures in Thatcher-era London. Set in the Pakistani community of South London in the 1980s, the film focuses on two youths, friends from schooldays. Johnny (Daniel Day-Lewis) is a working-class white whose friends belong to the National Front, a fascist group whose members extol "white power" and bash immigrants. Omar (Gordon Warnecke), a homosexual Pakistani, lives with his leftist father who spends most of his time in bed drinking. Omar's wealthy uncle, Nasser (Saeed Jaffrey), is determined to give one of the family a (small) step up, and at first gives him a lowly garage job, and then hands Omar a rundown laundrette. Omar and Johnny become lovers and decide to convert the laundrette into "a Ritz among laundrettes," a gaudy, neon-lit storefront called "Powders" complete with aquarium, video games, potted plants and piped classical muzak. Johnny looks upon the laundrette as a lifeline on which to salvage his self-respect, while Omar sees it as just the beginning step on the long road toriches. A thoughtful and innovative portrait of modern contrasts in class, race, and sex, this film defined a generation of Londoners. Sight and Sound
"...One of the most delicate and touching love scenes in contemporary cinema....Unemphatic, guileless, easy, touching and unashamedly erotic..." 12/01/1985 p.67

New York Times
"...Rude, wise, vivid social comedy....[Lewis gives] a performance that has both extraordinary technical flash and emotional substance..." 03/07/1986 p.C8

New York Times
Included in the New York Times "10 BEST FILMS OF 1986" 12/28/1986 p.II,19

Los Angeles Times
"...With the superb Jaffrey and Seth as linchpins, the cast is extraordinary..." 03/13/1986 p.C1

Chicago Sun-Times 8 of 10
The viewer is likely to go through a curious process while watching this film. At first there is unfamiliarity: Who are these people, and where do they come from, and what sort of society do they occupy in England? We get oriented fairly quickly and understand the values that are at work. Then we begin to wonder what the movie is about. It is with some relief that we realize it isn't "about" anything; it's simply some weeks spent with some characters in a way that tells us more about some aspects of modern Britain than we've seen before. - Roger Ebert