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Happy-Go-Lucky (2008)

Time Out rating

Average user rating

53 reviews

Synopsis

Poppy (Sally Hawkins) is a 30-year-old Londoner with a bright outlook on life. She loves her job, she loves her friends, she loves her freedom. Mike Leigh's new film follows her over a few weeks one spring as she learns to drive and embarks on a new romance.

Movie review

From Time Out London

Sally Hawkins is a real delight in Mike Leigh’s new film as Poppy, a 30-year-old Londoner with a bubbly nature and an ever-present laugh that teeters between lovable and annoying. Hawkins’ performance, and Leigh’s harnessing of it, is a tease: when we first see Poppy, cycling through the West End and joking with a grumpy bookshop assistant before joining her friends for a late-night drunken session, we don’t know what to make of her. She’s loud, joyful and indulges in terrible jokes; surely there’s something wrong with her?

The trick that Leigh and Hawkins finally pull off so cleverly by the end of 'Happy-Go-Lucky’ is that we’re entirely in cahoots with her. Poppy is a mirror to us all: if we find her blind optimism and sunny nature hard to swallow, perhaps there’s something wrong with us instead? By then, too, we know that Poppy is not the blinkered soul we may first think: she is compassionate, perceptive and harbours her own sadnesses like the rest of us.

Leigh always finds plot in character, and ‘Happy-Go-Lucky’ is more of a portrait than a story; a film that’s built around one performance. He is less concerned here, unlike, say, ‘Secrets & Lies’ and ‘Vera Drake’, with following a driving narrative than with minutely observing Poppy through her relationships with others, whether it’s the kids she teaches at her primary school, her repressed driving instructor (Eddie Marsan, excellently playing a heavy-duty bag of hang-ups), her close friend and flatmate Zoe (Alexis Zegerman) or her older, more settled colleague Heather (Sylvestra Le Touzel), whom she joins at flamenco lessons after work. In that sense, it’s comparable to ‘Naked’.

It’s a study in sadness versus happiness, a study in teachers and the taught, a study in how we carry with us everyday the burdens of what we have and haven’t learned. You know you’re watching something both delightfully light-footed and acutely meaningful when Leigh moves so nimbly between scenes at Poppy’s school, her flamenco class and her driving lessons. There’s also a wonderfully moving scene, darker and more poetic in tone, when Poppy encounters a tramp late at night. It’s a funny film – a surprise perhaps after ‘Vera Drake’ – and, crucially, it aches with truth.

Author: Dave Calhoun

Time Out London Issue 1965: April 17 - 23, 2008

User reviews of this film

nicky said...

Posted on May 16 2008 10:29 I feel the need to comment to save people wasting a couple of hours of their life watching this film. It was terrible. The only scenes that were even remotely funny were the driving lesson scenes, but apart from that i found myself cringing throughout. The london accents, the jokes....all awful, and ridiculous pointless scenes that had nothing to do with the film. I think this has to be the worst film i have ever seen at the cinema.

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Juju said...

Posted on May 15 2008 13:20 poppy was a bitch. she was openly laughing at people -taking the mickey out of her pregnant sister, stooping to the level of laughing at a destitute drunkard! her character was annoying, smug and if i had to spend two hours in a car with her rudeness and rubbish jobs, i would have gone mad too. this film was terrible.

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Kishan Radia said...

Posted on May 11 2008 14:25 Well put carly. There are many right wing people, underlying in our society that have an enormous habit of constant mis-judgement.

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Kishan Radia said...

Posted on May 11 2008 14:23 Brilliant film all around really. Great acting and very realistic. Very smart movie and it would be a better society to live in if there were more people as courageous and understanding and also compassionate as Poppy the character. An illustration that we should never laugh or judge people because of silly characteristics i.e. Poppy's childish and innocent laughter.

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carly said...

Posted on May 11 2008 09:22 I absolutely loved this film. Poppy was a breath of freah air and the instructor really did convey some of the sentiments of the british public who are simmering with anger ready to explode with their far right views.. woudl love to know what the tramp scene really represented if anyone has insight into that. Acting was a pleasure unforced and natural. Well done Mike Leigh!!!

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Mel said...

Posted on May 10 2008 21:19 I'm sad that so few people liked Happy Go Lucky. I thought it was fantastic. OK, a little far-fetched at times, but overall I thought it was a charming portrait of a very likable character. I don't think I took it quite as seriously as some of the other critics on this site, however I did relate to it, as much of the content (work-play-friendship scenes) reminded me of my younger housemate days. Poppy comes across as brave, caring, and a deeper thinker than you give her credit for at the beginning of the film. I also thought the film left you to make up your own mind what her background and future might have been which sometimes is much more interesting than being handed those facts on a plate. Bravo Mike Leigh.

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Stylianos Hatzipanagos said...

Posted on May 09 2008 09:12 A commentary on life at the level of Seneca, Aristotle and Socrates/Plato. Thoroughly recommended

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Lydia said...

Posted on May 08 2008 19:18 I was so excited to see this film, being a fan of Sally Hawkins but I left thoroughly confused at the message of the film. The lack of story line really bothered me and the snapshot of Poppy's life was really not sufficient for the time and money that I wasted. The tramp scene was ridiculous and after the night out, I was cringing at their overacting. Completely over the top although if it had been about an hour shorter, perhaps bearable. Cringey and sickening although Sally Hawkins did the best she could with such an uninspiring character!

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steve said...

Posted on May 08 2008 11:07 Well, I was meant to be seeing Bjork, but seeing as that she cancelled due to illness, I ended up seeing Happy Go Lucky and it made me smile. Hollywood blockbuster it isn't, but some great observation and performances, though to wrap up the bullying issue with the it'll all be fine now was patronising. I liked the tramp!

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Mares said...

Posted on May 08 2008 10:20 I saw this last night... and wish I hadn't bothered. Poppy is annoying and the scene with the tramp is totally unbelievbale... as if!!! Wait till it's shown on Film 4 later this year, that way you can change channels when her laugh starts to drive you up the wall!!

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Harriet said...

Posted on May 07 2008 22:10 Baffled by this film. I'd describe myself as a Mike Leigh fan but this movie, from the story (or lack of one) to the two dimensional characters (in some cases one dimensional), and the unrealistic dialogue and acting seemed by turns tediously shallow and surprisingly irritating. I initially tolerated Poppy's exaggerated, monotone chirpiness because I guessed that there lay something behind it, an event or neurosis from her past that it was a reaction to, which would be revealed and form the basis of the story and bring the film and Poppy to life but that was not to be. Surely no-one who is not about to have a nervous breakdown actually behaves like that in real life? I found the scenes with the bullying and with tramp distastefully glib and cheaply sentimental. Of course the most baffling thing is that so many people evidently loved this movie whilst I and many others thought it was awful. Isn't life funny?!

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maggie said...

Posted on May 07 2008 13:29 I wonder if there is any significance in the fact that most women seems to find this film a total let down and a waste of time? I went with 3 women friends and we were totally bored and wondered if we were missing something as we are fans of Mike Leigh. I read that much of it ended up on the cutting room floor but at nearly two hours it was still far too long with what seemed like acres of time filled with ums and ahs and no real dialogue. I got over my irritation with Poppy and admired her teaching style but her ability to solve a child's problems with a friendly social worker - "he'll be alright now" after one meeting!! Aye right! But I was so bored except for the confrontation at the end by which time I had lost the will to live... I am a very happy, content person who always finds the glass half full so it is not that I'm a cynic, honest.

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Caroline said...

Posted on May 06 2008 23:01 One of the worst films I've seen! By the end of it, I was the only person left in the cinema. My mistake, I should have followed the others' lead. There were times when I thought the whole thing was an overlong Catherine Tate sketch but without the 'punchline'. Avoid at all costs

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Erin Olsen said...

Posted on May 06 2008 22:43 At times I thought I would walk out of this film, but I'm glad I stayed. I will never ever forget the great performances by the actor who played the driving instructor - he was outstanding, And the actress who played the flamenco teacher - she was superb. Well done Mike Leigh.

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chelle said...

Posted on May 06 2008 19:35 Absolutely hated it. Thought Poppy was underdeveloped her flatmate an appalling actress and what was the homeless person scene all about!

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