Sugarhouse Gary Love UK 2007
Two men trapped in a disused factory argue for a disproportionate amount of time – no surprises then that this is an adaptation from a play. Shame then, that Sugarhouse doesn’t so much as break the fourth wall as it builds a third and second wall hemming the characters in.
Stephen Mackintosh’s white collar character Tom is led by the supposedly drug addled D (Ashley Walters) to his hideout, a disused factory, to negotiate the sale of a hand gun. D vacillates and invents ways to keep Tom occupied and then… and then the film seems to freeze for a period. Visually it doesn’t stop but it might as well do as the script absolutely refuses point blank to let these characters part company. Cue the arrival of Andy Serkis doing a Sir Ben (Kingsley) in Sexy Beast – i.e. shaving his scalp and going vein-pumpingly psychotic – and his pressure is exactly what is needed, it’s as if the blockage is cleared, the film can continue. But the damage has been done.
Many plays make great films and vice versa and sometimes staginess can be forgiven is the material or cast is up to it (Glengarry Glen Ross or the original Sleuth for example) but the issue here is that the opening third condemns to a box marked ‘conflict resolution’. By having a tight central duo who spend too much time in an abandoned factory with too little reason to keep them together except to explore their contrasting yet strangely resonant damaged characters what’s the point in being able to move the camera or make cuts.
Clearly the performances. Walters has it easiest playing the caricature of a crack-head that will suffice for the silent majority of audience members unfamiliar with such types aside from apologising profusely to their local Big Issue seller whilst walking by. Any number of ‘bloods’ and bad teeth with a sweaty brows, and jittery behaviour don’t quite guarantee that his acting is up to snuff but it certainly seems that way. Any doubts are leavened however when he gets his outpouring of emotion at the end. Of Mackintosh there is no doubt. He has the straighter role of the middle class man out of his depth and he convinces. No surprises then that the director Gary Love is an actor himself.
Despite the travails of turning a play into a film there are several incidental moments that reveal Love to have some scope. The main location, the factory, looks great and is well used, but the Robin Hood Estate in Tower Hamlets although used less looks better as Serkis’ character Hoodwink prowls around – particularly in one scene where he pounds along an raised outdoor walkway in yellow short and white trousers with shaved head with a machete! Even in long-shot it is a sight to behold.
Yet the clincher proving that Love has been hamstrung by choosing a play for his debut feature is one moment where Hoodwink swallows his rage. After delivering a vicious beating he leaves the scene and pauses going through some breathing exercises to constrain the anger. For a second or two the light changes as if the sun has gone behind a cloud. It’s a wonderfully evocative way of showing the anger dissipate, and just what the rest of the film needs more of.
