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marjane satrapis

Review: Grow Your Own, The Chronicles of Narnia- Prince Caspian and The Jammed

By Cinema and Reviews

Grow Your Own posterThe allot­ment is one of the United Kingdom’s greatest achieve­ments, unre­peated I believe any­where else. In exchange for mov­ing in to shoe­boxes stacked upon each oth­er the British poor were giv­en a back garden some­where else – a nearby shared field con­ver­ted into small plots where they could grow some food and still exper­i­ence some­thing of a life out­doors, con­nec­ted to the sea­sons. And who could have guessed that, at the same time, the allot­ment could also be such an effect­ive meta­phor for life in mod­ern England.

In Richard Laxton’s film Grow Your Own, the spare plots at a Liverpool allot­ment are being alloc­ated to refugees, to help them adjust to life in their new coun­try and give them some­thing to do dur­ing the oth­er­wise long days. The loc­als, led by ex-cop Big John (Philip Jackson) with the help of his down­trod­den son Little John (Eddie Marsan from Happy-Go-Lucky), don’t like the idea of their patch being invaded by “gypos” and turn a cold shoulder to their new neighbours.

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