Critiquing the directorial efforts of well-known actors is trickier than it seems. For example, it’s impossible to ignore, especially at a festival as prestigious and (increasingly) industrially relevant as Cannes, the added buzz they bring to a film; the expectations of, maybe sadistic hope for, failure and vanity. Among the expectations to which these films are beholden is the revelation of a distinct point of view, and whether or not viewers will be able to tell from which directors, with whom the actor has worked, they’ve drawn inspiration for their own vision.
In the case of Harris Dickinson’s film, Urchin, the influences are numerous and disparate. Among the artistic voices sprinkled over his story about the trials and tribulations of a London rough sleeper, Mike (Frank Dillane), are British Kitchen Sink dramas in the tradition of early Ken Loach and Lindsay Anderson; observers of the American outcast, like Jerry Schatzberg; and the Safdie Brothers. One can’t help but consider these influences as anything but overwhelming for a film that, while competently made and performed, is otherwise rather superficial and anonymous.
When we meet Mike, he has been living on the streets for five years. An early meeting with a good Samaritan, who takes him to get a bite to eat, goes wrong. A stolen watch and thrown punch land Mike back in jail for eight months; but the promise of a fresh start and clean(ish) slate when he’s out are the only upside to this momentary poor decision. From there, his tentative position within the British social services machine, a new job at a cheap hotel restaurant, and in relation to a vaguely articulated drug addiction, expose Mike as a twitching, raw nerve, sensitive to criticism and setback, and quick to act on impulse.
Dickinson’s filmmaking approach is one of long lens shots that put Mike and the other people in his orbit, be they rough sleepers or not, into the context of the city around them. The first half hour is full of what looks like mostly stolen shots, appropriate given the film’s already apparent lineage, but while they occasionally establish Mike as belonging to a larger unofficial society of rough sleepers in London, they fail to meaningfully ground the viewer in his perspective. That distance renders Mike’s impulsive choices not only more frustrating from an objective position, but less emotionally impactful than they could be, and perhaps need to be. An early scene with a fellow rough sleeper and apparent old friend, Nathan (Harris Dickinson, himself), is propelled by a confrontational charge; Mike believes Nathan stole his wallet, but Nathan disputes it, and says Mike owes him money anyways. The argument turns into an all-out brawl, and the onlookers are a mixture of paid background actors and genuinely caught-unaware Londoners gawking at the spectacle of flailing limbs and stretched t-shirts. Because the whole scene is observed from a significant distance, the viewer has no choice but to identify with the confused onlookers and gawk at the young men with them.
A gritty realism dominates most of Urchin’s runtime, but when Dickinson finally makes his camera do something different with unannounced departures from reality, it’s difficult to grasp his intent. While Mike takes a shower in his temporary housing, the camera starts to circle the drain (yes), and takes the viewer down the pipes into a trippy CGI-rendered underworld that at times resembles the depths of space and in others DNA under a microscope. The intent is, once again, largely unclear, though when the camera emerges from this non-place and reveals a mossy rock and tunnel-like cave, at the end of which we see Mike looking out into the light, one can faintly grasp at Dickinson’s attempt at representing Mike’s subconscious.
Urchin is never fully committed to the grit, marginality, or momentous pulse, respectively, of its most obvious influences. There are additional flights of fancy, fueled by Mike’s worsening drug addiction, that remove him from his increasingly grim circumstances; a memory-jolting trip to a performance art show and a hallucination involving a street violinist and a church are among a few that establish Mike’s tether to reality, and regular society, as rapidly weakening. But Dickinson seems unprepared, or unwilling, to express much about the real world beyond the fact that Mike’s life is miserable; unable to draw connections, other than the most cursory, between his decline and the inadequacies of the UK’s social safety net. In a new era of austerity in British society, it’s unfortunate Dickinson doesn’t find a way to let it play a larger role in this film. Dickinson is not yet 29 years old and, like almost all first-time directors, is still finding a point of view, so one wants to afford him grace in this regard. At his best, he’s shown he’s a capable stylist, albeit one lacking a clearly defined purpose in Urchin.
Published as part of Cannes Film Festival 2025 — Dispatch 3.
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