Rent Boy A (2007)

An excellent Mullan is the only high point in this dour & forgettable drama (light spoilers) - Boy A review by Timmy B

Boy A is a film which will have vastly different impacts depending on who watches it. For anyone under a certain age who hasn't lived in the UK, it will be a drama which looks at the rehabilitation and new life of a young man who has served a significant prison sentence for murder. But for anyone over the age of 35, it takes on a totally different meaning. The UK is a country which will forever in some way be scarred by the murder of Jamie Bulger, a 3 year old child, committed by 2 young boys who kidnapped him from a shopping centre and killed him in a way which can only be described as complete evil. And despite the changing of the young victim to a schoolgirl the same age as the film's perpetrators, the real-life case hangs heavy over this film.

Eric Wilson (Garfield) has just been released from prison, given a new identity and moved across the country. He is supported by Terry (Mullan,) a decent & fiercely compassionate case worker, who has spent huge amounts of his time readying Eric for his release, to the detriment of his own family. After choosing the name Jack, Eric takes a job at a factory, makes friends and begins a romance with Michelle. However, his new identity is at risk of being exposed, as well as his inner turmoil at living essentially a double life.

I always give credit to films/media which have bold and sometimes provocative storylines. And this film touches on a profound trauma which still affects the UK decades after the horrific murder. But, there are unfortunately not many good elements which lift it out of the soapy territory which you feel the film is trying to break out of.

By far, the best part of this film is Peter Mullan. Pretty much everything I have seen him in, he elevates. Whether it is a couple of scenes or the whole narrative, he is never less than compelling, with a magnetic screen presence. And he is one of a rare group of actors that effortlessly switches between fierce compassion, such as this performance, and a terrifying anger & threat, in films such as Tyrannosaur. In the few scenes he has, he really elevates the film, which is made all the more pertinent when you wish he was on screen more. But for me, that's really where the positives end.

My main issue was actually with the way Eric/Jack is written, as well as Garfield's performance. I fully appreciate that Jack is in many ways still a child, trapped inside a man's body, whose innocence was lost by his significant prison sentence. But I found him unbelievably tiresome the longer the film went on. Garfield imbues him with a myriad of tics, stammering and incessant questioning which really starts to become annoying. There were a couple of points where characters ask him simple questions and he just splutters & grunts as he tries to answer, which then starts to look like overacting. And even though Garfield is an extremely accomplished actor who has subsequently gone on to do great work, the longer this film goes on, the more acting pills it looks like he has swallowed.

Other characters don't get served much better. The romance between Jack and Michelle tries to dig a little deeper, and the intimacy between them is sensitively handled, but again we are 2 chess piece moves away from Hollyoaks territory.

The biggest shame about all this is that there is actually a real sensitivity about how the young characters lives are affected by this horrendous murder, with legitimate questions raised, which the film rightly gives no easy answers to. But it never manages to be anything more that a melodrama with one great performance and a central protagonist who I found increasingly irritating, despite it's noble ambitions to be something more