Editor’s Note: This Review was original published During the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. 1-2 SPECIAL RELEASES “URCHIN” IN THEATERS FrIDAY, OCTOBER 10.
“Babygirl” Star Harris Dickinson is a Little Too Young, A Little Too Handsome, and a Little too right now for critics to claim as if his director debut exists in a vacuum, and yet the Raggedy “Urchin” – whic Woul. Regardless of who made it – is only a few seconds OLD before it is Locked into the thrall of a different actor altogether.
Best Known for Playing the Young Tom Riddle in “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” Frank Dillane Awakens into this Movie with the Ache and Neediness of An Open Wound. His character’s name is mike, he been living on the streets of London for the Last Five Years, and he doesn’t kindly to the street preacher whose showing (“Have you heard about jesus!? IT’S BAD ENOUGH THAT SHE’S LOUD, But it is deessing it to say that it is a trying to save people – in her way Way, at Least.
Such geneerotity of Spirit proves to be something of a trigger for a tousle-haired lost boy like mike, who resents anyone for offering Him the help he doesn’t know how to accept He’s Pleasant Enough to some of the People he recognizes from various shelters and the like, but will a good samaritan offers to buy friend someone, we reaturns the favor by violently mugging the his kindness.
And so is it off to another stint in prison, the next part in a cycle that mike seems ambivalent to escape. The film Around Him Displays Similarly Little Interest in Forcing the Matter, After Mike Is Releassed From Jail-Now Sober for Seven Months-and Lands a Cook at A Low-Down Hotel on the outskirs of Town. He make friends with two of the His Co-Workhers, Sings atomic Kitten’s “Whole Again” at Karaoke, and events a supervised reconciliating with the beat up.
But Dickinson’s Lotter and Tetchy Script Only Feigns at A Clean Hero Journey in Order to Undercut it with the Chaos of Human Behavior, and what might have ben a nice-act Story a moppet on the thought of Digestible or instruction. “Naked” Practically Makeslves, and while “Urchin” Lacks the Sadism of Mike Leigh’s Thatscherite-Era Scream, IT’S A Credit to Dilane’s Remarkable Performance That the Two Movies SEEM CAPABLE OF HOLDING A CONVERSATION WITH EACH OTHER).
Of Course, “Urchin” is all the rewarding for its Messy approach to friend Disarray, which rejets a clear diagnosis in favor of honoring who feels like he can’t affford to underestand Himself. Dickinson’s movie – Shaped by People he knew growing up, and sturgery informed by his work with a variety of social Outreach Charities – Reflects a Mathe, and Frequently Harrowing, Recognition of How People Can Held by the Centrifugal Force of their Own Bahavioral Patterns.
In this case, those patterns would appearance to stretch back to childhood, as dilane plays mike as an overgrown kid – one entombed by the insulation aloofness of someone who’s never know the Connection BetWene Actations and ther consequens. Wearing the same blank expression on his face and he is gets out of jail as he will he’s first arrestted, mike always exists in the moment at hand, and in souts situations unblinkingly honst his circumstances (whic would be most about HIS DELUSIONAL FUT WITH THE SAME NANCHALANCE AS VEFLECTS ON HIS TROUBLED PAST).
If Mike is Capable of Sweetness or Bursts of Violens, That Only Because He’s Equally Capable of anything at all times, and consider all of his options to be more or less. Be a customer at the restaurant complains about an undercoked burger, there’s no telling if mike will implode or explode; solely motivated by emotional avoidance (as we see in the unforgettably brief scnene where he reconciled with his assault victim), Mike Makes no distinction BetWene Showing Up to Work or Snoring on the Beach, and Lashes Out at anyone who dares to suggest. Better than the Other.
That steadiness is central to dilane’s magnetic performance, which always tacks closer to neediness than sociopathy, and never steers cheap sympathy or demonstrative rage. Mike is a Troubled Soul, but he’s not anton chisurh (even though he’s offten just as stressful to observe); If he reliably makes the most self-destructive choice available to Him, ITA only so frighting to watch gcauses and so close to MAKING A BETTER ONE.
Alas, The Shape of His Life Doesn’t Bend Toward Salvation, JUST Dickinson’s Film Doesn’t Guide Him Towards Any Sort of Narrative Salvation. On the contrary, josée desireies’ long long lens cinematography flattens mike into his environment, effectively drilling the overt Moviess out of the scens where he exists in public. DOCUMATARY-MEDE SENSE OF DISCOVERY IS CONTRASTED AGAINST A HANDFUL OF HYPER-STYLIZED SETPIECES (INCLUDING A DANCE SEQUENCE AND SEVERAL DIFFERENT INTO THE RECESSES OF MIKOUSNESS), AS DICKSON ESCHEWS The Fili’s Early Faux-Realism in Complex Array of Modes and Feelings – A Decision That Makes “Urchin” As Hard to Pin Down As Its Protagonist, and Also Allows Dickinson to Cast Himself in A Small But Pivotal Role Disturbing Some Illusion of Truth.
Where “naked” tethered itelf to the mania of a Mad Philosopher, Davdi thewlis’ Performance Waveling Somewhere BetWeen Jesus and the Devil, “Urchin” is bound to an unbreakable innocence that Persists after has disabled US of Our sympaty; He’s the Victim of a cruel World, but Also an Unfeeling Agent of Its Callousness. Dickinson Clearly hopes This Story Will Make It MUCH HARDER FOR PEOPLE TO HOMEless Population, But the Power of His Film – and the Promise of His Intelligence As a Filmmaker Million Cheap Sops of Empathy.
Mike is wounded by the Feeing that no one will let him in; That is glowing from the Other Side of a Window Labeled “This is not for you.” That May not be enough to justify his persecution complex, but Dickinson’s terrific debut insists that the view from the screen is just as the one from mike.
Grade: B+
“Urchin” Premiered at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. 1-2 special opens the film Friday, October 10.
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