The Last of England (1987)

I once attended University film classes and one of the courses was in European cinema . Our tutor Rolland was a flamboyant , larger than life character , very erudite and knowledgeable in his field but his tastes weren't exactly mainstream and one night the class was doing experimental European cinema " Now we're going to be seeing some Derek Jarman " " Aw no " I cried " " Ah Theo you must hate me ? " " Well thatdepends on what we're watching . It's not the last of England is it ? "" yes it is "" Aw no " I shrieked by which time the atmosphere in the class became one of intrigue as the other students became curious as to why a film could bring out such emotions from someone " but it's totally gay " Rolland replied in camp mock anger " Of course it's gay . Jarman was gay , he died from AIDS didn't you know that " " That's no excuse to wave penises at the screen " Laughs from the other students " Ah Theo now I understand - you have a small penis problem " cue laughter from the other students that seemed to last a lifetime I'd certainly recommend a Rolland film class . They're always interesting and informative with interaction class discussion and much laughter . The downside is you have to watch a Jarman film now and again Derek Jarman in invariably described as " a challenging film maker " which is pseudo-speak for pretentious art house garbage . TLOE is Jarman at his most challenging indeed and anyone attracted to narrative cinema need not to watch this The story at its most basic features a post apocalypse landscape and images that almost defy description . A youth has sex with a painting , a woman played by Tilda Swinton tears off her wedding dress , a man forages for food in a dustbin , with the images cutting to para military soldiers patrolling the devastated streets . Add to this abstract voice overs , sequences filmed in black and white 8 mm . time lapse photography and homosexual frotting and you've got a film that will only appeal to the most pretentious art-house cinema junkie . The only reason for watching it is that you can claim you've seen one of the most ostentatious films ever made and remind yourself that rubbish like this used to appear on Channel 4 every Thursday in the late 1980s and that British cinema was taking quantum leaps in quality ten years later

"On a green hill, mourners stand and weep for the last of England," intones Nigel Terry at the start of this arresting mission statement from art-house infant* terrible Jarman. The film is a barrage of striking imagery, mixing old Super 8 footage of a child playing in the back garden with shots of a teenage punk shooting up in a garage, and the middle-aged Jarman, apparently chronicling vanishing species of plant in some kind of futuristic warehouse. Then there's clips from news reports, audio of Hitler, some staged stuff about paramilitaries and - of course - a naked yuppie having sex with a soldier on a massive Union Jack. An air of paralysing despair permeates this one-of-a-kind movie, which takes on state-sponsored violence, the Thatcher government, misguided building projects, the trashing of the environment and American cultural imperialism - all in the opening half hour. Not all of it hits the target, and some of it may only make sense to Jarman, but for every piece of self-mythologising pretentiousness there's a pithily employed phrase (courtesy of T.S. Eliot or Allen Ginsberg) or thought-provoking juxtaposition. Like the sounds of a Nazi rally segueing into a vicious sideswipe at military discipline, then military pageantry. Or widow Tilda Swinton ripping her wedding dress to shreds - even as she wears it - on a nuclear beach. The Last of England plays like the forlorn, obscene illegitimate child of Humphrey Jennings' hymn to the nation - Listen to Britain. I liked it. Great soundtrack too, put together by Simon Fisher-Turner, and containing Elgar, Marianne Faithful and a spot-on pastiche of '30s musical numbers called Broadway Boy.*Yeah, I know this should have an 'e'. IMDb isn't so sure.

This is the sort of movie which is usually defended with a phrase such as 'Oh you clearly didn't understand' or 'It's narrative is too unorthodox'. The sad fact is the film's limited distribution is due to its own wretched pretensions rather than its intelligence. A barrage of depressing images (man shoots up, man humps portrait of woman and so on) and an endless meandering dialogue is not enough to make a film involving. Jarman's intention is clear, Thatcher's Britain was every bit as horrible as it is shown to be here but surely there were better ways to articulate that. His work remains infuriating rather than involving and for that reason alone this film must be judged a failure.

Jarmen manages to create a world stinging from Thatcherite policies, with viscious imagery burning on the screen. If you want an indictment of the eighties without irony loaded sentimentality or crass stereotypes, then experience The Last of England.