VIEW THIS PAGE After his powerful study of alienation and skinhead culture in This is England, Shane Meadows’ Somers Town might come as a bit of a letdown. It’s shot in black and white, runs for a mere 75 minutes, and is not really about anything at all. Just two lads in London, one a runaway from the Midlands, the other the son of a Polish construction worker, getting up to some high jinks because they have nothing better to do.
Despite it being a comparatively slight work, Somers Town reflects Meadows’ deep understanding of youth set adrift in a world that has no obvious place for them. According to Variety magazine, the film was financed by Eurostar, and the London-Paris service and the new terminal at St Pancras are prominent both physically and as a narrative backdrop to the story. There are brief moments when the director’s responsibilities to his sponsors intrude ever so slightly, but Meadows has too clear a conception of what he wants to allow Somers Town to descend into a piece of extended product placement.
Thomas Turgoose, who made a stunning debut in This Is England, is back as Tomo, a runaway from the Midlands who is trying his luck in London. He is far from being a likable scalawag, and is clearly a grifter to his bones, never missing an opportunity to see what he can get out of even the most casual of contacts. He meets up with Marek, who is in London to spend time with his father, a worker on the new Eurostar terminal. Marek too is at a loose end, as his father works days and drinks away the night with mates.
The relationship between the boys is never quite easy, even though Tomo talks his way into bunking in Marek’s room without his father’s knowledge. The relationship is enlivened by Graham, a shady businessman who is constantly sorting through his garage filled with assorted goods of unclear provenance, and Maria (Elisa Lasowski), a French woman working in London who becomes the object of a romantic fantasy for the two lads.
The surface lightness hovers over a darker world that is acknowledged but then generally ignored. Instead of drifting into the world of street violence, as Turgoose’s character did in This is England, the lads are allowed to create an ephemeral paradise amid the rough streets of inner city London. Short as it is, Somers Town has plenty to enjoy, not least Meadow’s outstanding ability to capture the elusive mood shifts and listless enthusiasms of his two young leads. VIEW THIS PAGE
On April 26, The Lancet published a letter from two doctors at Taichung-based China Medical University Hospital (CMUH) warning that “Taiwan’s Health Care System is on the Brink of Collapse.” The authors said that “Years of policy inaction and mismanagement of resources have led to the National Health Insurance system operating under unsustainable conditions.” The pushback was immediate. Errors in the paper were quickly identified and publicized, to discredit the authors (the hospital apologized). CNA reported that CMUH said the letter described Taiwan in 2021 as having 62 nurses per 10,000 people, when the correct number was 78 nurses per 10,000
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