thu 28/03/2024

DVD: No Surrender | reviews, news & interviews

DVD: No Surrender

DVD: No Surrender

Scouse Wars: Alan Bleasdale's black comedy of sectarian violence in Eighties Liverpool

Not going gentle: the Catholic OAPs (James Ellis, centre) claim a moral victory in 'No Surrender'
1985 was an annus mirabilis for harsh Liverpool comedies, both of them. Letter to Brezhnev, about two Liver birds wooed by Soviet sailors, was the quintessential grassroots production of the British Film Renaissance. No Surrender, Alan Bleasdale’s sole foray into cinema, was a £2 million epic farce about sectarian fury erupting when two coachloads of OAPs are double booked into a Stanley Road nightclub one New Year’s Eve. (A group of infirm geriatrics, wailing and flailing, also materialises.) Arriving on DVD this month, it has lost none of its edge as a bracing blend of reality, absurdity and caustic Scouse wit.
1985 was an annus mirabilis for harsh Liverpool comedies, both of them. Letter to Brezhnev, about two Liver birds wooed by Soviet sailors, was the quintessential grassroots production of the British Film Renaissance. No Surrender, Alan Bleasdale’s sole foray into cinema, was a £2 million epic farce about sectarian fury erupting when two coachloads of OAPs are double booked into a Stanley Road nightclub one New Year’s Eve. (A group of infirm geriatrics, wailing and flailing, also materialises.) Arriving on DVD this month, it has lost none of its edge as a bracing blend of reality, absurdity and caustic Scouse wit.

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