Film

Somers Town

Name: Somers Town
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Released: 2008
Cast: Thomas Turgoose, Piotr Jagiello, Elisa Lasowski, Kate Dickie, Perry Benson

Coming-of-age

Shane Meadows' tender portrait of two teenage boys meeting in the shadow of King's Cross—one a Polish construction worker's son, one a runaway from Nottingham. It's shot in grainy 16mm, moves at the pace of a hot London summer, and finds genuine comedy and heartbreak in small moments. For anyone who remembers being young and lonely and suddenly less so.

TMDb rating

3.4

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like small, observant stories where two lonely kids circle each other without much talk, and a city's grey corners do most of the emotional work.

Skip it if you need plot momentum or a clear arc, since this drifts through idle afternoons and odd jobs and rarely hurries anywhere.

What it asks of you: Seventy-one minutes of unhurried patience, with long silences, aimless walks and small talk that carries more feeling than it lets on.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

This Is England2007

Meadows' breakthrough about a bullied boy who finds belonging in a skinhead crew. Raw, funny, devastating, and utterly alive to how friendship forms when you're that age.

But The subject matter—racism, violence, the appeal of extremism—sits heavy. It doesn't flinch from any of it, which some find punishing rather than enlightening.

Fish Tank2009

Andrea Arnold's precise, muscular film about a volatile girl in a London housing estate who wants to be a dancer. Captures the same claustrophobic heat and the electricity of young people trying to escape.

But It's bleak and doesn't offer easy catharsis. The ending lands like a punch you don't see coming, which is the point, but not everyone wants that from cinema.

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner1962

A young Nottingham lad in a borstal finds solace in running. The spiritual ancestor of British social realism—poetic, angry, and intimate about how class and circumstance shape the young.

But It's in black and white and the pacing is deliberate. If you want plot momentum, you won't find it; the film is all mood and internal life.

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Somers Town

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Together2000

Both films are about boys finding each other across circumstance, told with genuine affection and without condescension. Neither needs dramatic incident to justify itself.

Lukas Moodysson's Swedish film about two half-brothers navigating adolescence in the 1970s. Warm, funny, slightly chaotic—captures the exact flavor of summers when nothing happens and everything changes.

But It's in Swedish with subtitles, and the narrative drifts like a memory rather than building toward anything. The pacing will feel shapeless if you're expecting plot resolution.

Kes1970

Ken Loach's masterpiece about a boy and his hawk in industrial Yorkshire. Transforms a simple premise into something transcendent about freedom, care, and what we're capable of when someone believes in us.

But The cruelty—from school, from home, from authority—is relentless. The ending is brutal. It's a film about how systems fail young people, and it doesn't soften that message.

In America2003

Jim Sheridan's film about an Irish family arriving in New York, seen through their youngest daughter's eyes. Aching and life-affirming; finds magic in ordinary struggle and the friendships that save us.

But It's more sentimental than Somers Town. If you're looking for hardness and refusal to console, this wears its heart on the outside.

Aftersun2022

Charlotte Wells' quietly devastating debut about a father and daughter on holiday. Elliptical, handheld, suffused with the melancholy of time passing and the things we don't say to people we love.

But There's no plot in the conventional sense. It's all impression and feeling. If you need narrative propulsion, you'll find it frustratingly slow.

The Souvenir2019

Joanna Hogg's semi-autobiographical film about a film student in 1980s London. Fractured, gorgeous cinematography; captures the exact texture of young adulthood and how we mistake intensity for love.

But It's deliberately oblique. Hogg withholds information and clarity. Some find it pretentious; others find that withholding is the whole point.

Seventeen2019

Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert's vibrant, chaotic portrait of a teenager in modern Ohio. Shot like a music video but grounded in real loneliness and the hunger to belong and be seen.

But It's aggressively stylized. The visual language—quick cuts, distortion, brightness—can feel exhausting if you're not already bought in.

A Prophet2009

Jacques Audiard's incisive prison drama about a young man who learns to survive and eventually thrive behind bars. Shows friendship and alliance forming under extreme pressure, with real moral complexity.

But It's French, subtitled, and set entirely in prison. The violence is unflinching. It's a serious film about serious things, not looking for lightness.

La Haine1995

Both are Europeanly precise about working-class young men and the small rebellions of friendship. Both shoot in formats that feel intimate and slightly anachronistic.

Mathieu Kassovitz's black-and-white masterpiece about three friends in a Paris housing estate over twenty-four hours. Propulsive, visually stunning, and devastatingly funny about friendship as survival.

But It's dated 1995 and deeply French in sensibility. If you're looking for a film that mirrors modern Britain exactly, this is 1990s Paris instead, which some find distant.

Moonlight2016

Both use cinema as pure mood—light, color, silence—to convey what dialogue can't. Both suggest that sometimes the most important story is just two people understanding each other.

Barry Jenkins' three-chapter film about a Black boy in Miami growing up across poverty, sexuality, and the possibility of love. Luminous, tender, and structured around the friendships that shape us.

But It moves very slowly. The dialogue is spare. If you need external conflict or dramatic incident, you may find it emotionally inert rather than quietly profound.