A substance-addicted head teacher wrestles with his mental health amid his school's impending closure.
Review by Eric Hillis
Directed by: Tim Mielants
Starring: Cillian Murphy, Tracey Ullman, Jay Lycurgo, Simbi Ajikawo, Emily Watson
With his absurdist 2020 neo-noir Patrick, Belgian director Tim Mielants proved himself adept at taking us on a whirlwind tour of a unique location, in that case a Flemish nudist camp. With Steve, he's given a similar task of immersing the audience in a distinct and confined setting, an English boarding school for the sort of teenage boys once referred to as "juvenile delinquents." Mielants nails the chaotic setting, but the script by Max Porter (adapted from his novella 'Shy') never quite makes the characters as interesting as the backdrop, despite some stellar performances from veterans and newcomers alike.
'Shy' was centred on its title character, one of the teenage residents of the home, but in bringing his book to the screen Porter has shifted his focus to the school's head teacher Steve (Cillian Murphy). Set over a 24 hour period in the summer of 1996, the film sees an increasingly volatile Steve struggle to cope with the news that his school is set to be shut down within six months. That news couldn't break at a worse time. A local news crew has arrived to film a special interest segment, interviewing both staff and pupils, and a Tory MP (Roger Allam) is set to visit.
Along with those inconveniences are Steve's usual issues of trying to control the unruly young men who inhabit this anarchic institution. Fights break out over the pettiest of reasons, sometimes with the staff on the receiving end of sinister threats. Steve tries to walk a thin line between stern parent and best mate with each of the boys, but seems to veer too far towards the latter. He also has serious substance abuse issues, which his colleagues largely turn a blind eye to, save for his deputy Amanda (Tracey Ullman), a self-appointed big sister to this self-appointed big brother. On this busy day, Steve is too distracted to realise that his most troubled charge, Shy (Jay Lycurgo), has received crushing news of his own, his mother coldly informing him via a phone call that she's cutting him out of her life. As the day progresses, both Steve and Shy seem to be hurtling towards self-destruction.
With its '90s setting, all baggy jeans and curtains haircuts, Steve has the look of a lost British TV movie from that period. You could imagine the great Alan Clarke tackling this scenario, and Mielants' roving camera certainly owes a debt to Clarke's energised style. But Clarke was a master of balancing roaming cameras with characterisation - his protagonists sped through the corridors of their worlds but always felt fully fleshed out. Here Mielants' camera whizzes by his characters without making much of an impact.
Steve is a thinly sketched protagonist, defined largely by his addiction. We never really get to know any of his pupils, as though the film is as distracted as Steve himself. We hear Steve and other staff talk about what great young men they really are but all we're ever shown is their unruliness and macho posturing. In the current climate, a lot of people have lost patience with aggressive young men, so the film's failure to make any of them sympathetic (save, arguably, for Shy) feels like an abdication of duty. The relatively blasé reaction to a female teacher (Simbi Ajikawo) receiving threats of sexual violence from one of the boys will erode much of the support for this well-meaning venture.
It's a shame Steve's characters are so thinly drawn, as every cast member is on top form here. Murphy could arguably take the treble down a few notches off his high-pitched hysterics, but the supporting players make the film eminently watchable. Ullman excels in a rare dramatic role that may well spawn a late career renaissance. Ajikawo, aka the rapper Lil Simz, isn't given much to do but acquits herself well in her scenes with her bombastic leading man. The young cast bring an authentic anarchy to their roles, which makes it feel like a greatly missed opportunity to develop these roles more convincingly.
Moving at breakneck pace, Steve doesn't give you much time to question its dramatic decisions in the moment, but on reflection you might wonder what point it's actually trying to make. If it's arguing in favour of institutions like this I'm not sure it does a very good job, as we're shown little proof that Steve and his methods have had a positive impact on these troubled teens. When the film closes with a voiceover in which Steve tells us the best features of each of the boys in his care, we're left to wonder if he's being self-delusional, as the film never gives us much evidence to support such an optimistic appraisal.
Steve is in UK/ROI cinemas from September 19th.
