John Carr Movies

A romantic farce that enjoys but never makes fun of its protagonists, this is an entertaining story about the unlikely pairing of a Liverpool factory worker and a Russian sailor. The romantic Teresa (Margi Clarke)works in a chicken factory and looks forward to the men she might meet on the weekends. Her friend Elaine (Alexandra Pigg) is living on state aid and is fairly casual about how she can pick up a little extra cash. One weekend the two women set out for the dancehall with someone else's hard-earned money, lifted by Teresa, and there they meet two Russian sailors, Peter (Peter Firth) and Sergei (Alfred Molina). For Elaine and Peter, it is love at first sight, and they spend the rest of the night talking and the following day wandering around Liverpool, hand in hand. When the dreaded parting of the ways comes at last, Elaine is furious that a small thing like politics has to keep them apart -- so she writes a letter to Brezhnev, with surprising results. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Set in 1940s England, Distant Voices/Still Lives is a compassionate look at a radically dysfunctional family. The son and his mother must endure the casual and overt cruelties of the bull-necked father. The ongoing abuse takes its toll in the form of failed marriages and misguided attempts at seeking security outside the family unit. As was the case with his earlier short subject trilogy (The Children, Madonna and Child, Death and Transfiguration), director Terence Davies based much of the material on his own life, combining rheumy-eyed cynicism with soft-edged nostalgia (the musical track, drawn from popular wartime songs, is particularly evocative). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide