Naked (Mike Leigh, 1993)
I had been meaning to see this for quite some time. This was more entertaining than I expected it to be but also more troubling. It follows to sociopaths who run around bothering (if not terrorizing) everyone who comes in their path. One is rich (working out in a Fred Perry shirt? What is wrong with you?) and one is the down and out Johnny who makes up the bulk of the film. Johnny appears to be pure id at times. One moment he’s a philosopher and occasionally profound or at least amusing (“did you know that no matter where you are standing in London you are only 30 feet away from a rat?”) but then wing nutty the enxt moment hwne he's going on about Nostradamus or the apocalyptic implications in the bible or some other nonsense. While the gender dynamics in Naked are troubling I liked that there was so much unexplained. Like Johnny and Louise’s past. The best part is the wandering. Johnny spends night in London and he approaches people, imposes on them, and pontificates at them. You peer into their lives and tHen they vanish. Cinema lets you do this better than anything else. Some of the camera work is pretty darn good.