Suddenly, there’s a whole slew of amazing movies in the Cinemas. I blame it on BOND – it’s opened the doors again (TENET was too soon). I managed to see two of them this week, DUNE (which I’ll review later) and LAST NIGHT IN SOHO, which I saw… ahem… last night in Soho (at Picturehouse Central)
In LAST NIGHT IN SOHO, Edgar Wright has crafted a deliriously vibrant, historical supernatural mystery thriller. It feels like if Baz Luhrman had decided to make an Argento-style Giallo horror flick. And it’s an incredible dark love-letter to Soho, an area I’ve worked in for more than 20 years and have enormous affection for.
The story is about teenage fashion designer – and 60s style obsessive – Eloise (Thomasin McKenzie), who thinks her dreams have come true when she gets accepted into the London College of Fashion. But London really is a different place to her rural home in Redruth and the reality soon hits home. She’s a sensitive soul – in more ways than one – and starts having vividly real dreams of life in 60s London. She finds herself captivated by a young aspiring starlet – Sandy (Anya Taylor-Joy) and experiences her life as she enters the glamorous and fantastical world of swinging 60s London. Of course, this veneer masks a seedy underbelly that soon makes itself brutally apparent.
For Eloise, these dreams soon become more than just dreams – they may actually be a direct portal into that era, bringing the ghosts of the violent, seedy past into her present. Threatening her sanity and ultimately – her life!
Edgar Wright has always been a clever, technically proficient and dynamic storyteller. He’s most famous for his comedy collaborations with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost (the Cornetto Trilogy) but in recent years he’s very much charted a different direction, taking on more serious projects. This film is his most “adult” yet – and he shows himself to be a virtuoso filmmaker in yet another genre. There’s a grounded grittiness to the characters and – most interestingly – it’s the first film he’s made with female protagonists. His handling of the unpleasant, exploitative side of 60s soho as well as the relationships between Elly and her friends in the present is sensitive and rings true. It sails past the Bechdel test with flying colours.
The cast are all great. Matt Smith plays an enjoyably menacing Teddy-boy character. And Anya Taylor-Joy is hypnotically compelling on screen, as she was in THE QUEENS GAMBIT. Dame Diana Rigg has a significant role in there too – and though it’s sad to know that it was her final film, it does feel like a fitting and oddly-appropriate tribute, especially when you consider her star power in the 60s. And there’s also a memorable role for Terrence Stamp, who feels so ridiculously suited to this movie I couldn’t imagine anyone else doing his role. 60s cool indeed.
It’s a beautiful looking film. The visions of sixties Soho are quite literally breathtaking – I heard an audible gasp in the cinema when the first shot of the Cafe De Paris is revealed in all its glory. It truly feels like the past brought to life. The cinematography by Chung-hoon Chung drags us into a fantasy world painted in neon shades of red and blue. And I have to talk about the soundtrack – which is a phenomenal selection of music from that era. The use of music, how it complements the storytelling, is just electrifying. And the scene of Sandie’s audition at a club, made the hairs go up on the back of my neck!
So, if you’re in the mood for a dark valentine to Soho and the Sixties, this film will hopefully go down like a glass of fine claret. Enjoy the Grand Guignol!
