Shane Meadows returns with 'This is England'

The 'Dead Man's Shoes' director will draw on his own experiences to examine the rise of the National Front's y

May 13 2005

UPDATE - 'This is England' feature here.

After last year's brilliant, unforgettable 'Dead Man's Shoes', Shane Meadows has announced his next film, a hard-hitting drama that will deal with homegrown racism in the UK.

'Oi! This is England' will be set in the Midlands in the summer of 1983, and tell the tale of an 11-year-old boy who loses his father, shaves his head and falls in with the local division of the National Front.

The uncompromising story will revolve around the race riots that were tearing Thatcher's Britain apart at the time, and Meadows admits that much of it is inspired by his own experiences growing up in Uttoxeter in the early 1980s.

'The pulsing music and the skin-tight fashion, the "fuck the state" attitude and the primal violence left an enormous emotional print on me,' he told Variety. 'I believe this period of my life is the reason I became a filmmaker.'

The 'TwentyFourSeven' director is also calling the project his most overtly political film to date.

Filming is due to start soon, although there's no word yet as to whether Paddy Considine, Meadows' longtime collaborator and sometime writing partner, will play any part in proceedings.

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