Harry Brown
For two-time Academy Award winner Sir Michael Caine, the character of Harry Brown and the world in which he lives struck a personal chord. Like Harry, Caine is an ex-serviceman - he fought in Korea - and he too grew up in the East End, living just around the corner from the Heygate Estate in The Elephant and Castle, where several key scenes were shot.
‘With this role, my life experience is almost set up for it,’ he says. ‘I come from the slums, I come from a hard background, I come from a poor family and I was a soldier.
‘These days, I push myself into more difficult roles and this seemed very difficult. It is about a sad situation, which is dear to my heart, namely the way things have gone with young people now.
'We shot at The Elephant and Castle, where I grew up. I have just spent three weeks back where I was born, talking to the young people who this is about, and it’s obviously a failure of us, education, family, everything.
'We have failed these children and when you see the flats that they are living in the impression you get is that if you treat people like animals they will probably become animals. And that’s what we have done because those flats on the Heygate Estate are disgusting, completely unliveable.
The actor maintains that the film highlights a major problem with modern British society. ‘It’s about violence and why that world is violent,’ continues Caine. ‘And in the case of Harry Brown, the character I play, you see how innocent people are turned into criminals, just to defend themselves.
'You see in the newspaper: "Police arrest man for defending himself", over and over again or "Man killed for defending himself". I don’t live in that social world any more but I do come from that social background so I understand it.’
The cast and filmmakers like director Daniel Barber, actors Emily Mortimer and Charlie Creed-Mile all come from different backgrounds and yet all are united in expressing concern at the violence that festers in deprived inner city areas.
‘Daniel told me a story when we first began working on the project,’ begins producer of the film Kris Thykier. ‘He said he lived on an estate in London when he was at college and said that the bit in the script that he really chimed with was when Harry was in the flat and opened the curtains to see that there’s a racist attack happening on a neighbour. What do you do? Run out and stop it? Get yourself involved or close the curtains?
The director himself, Daniel Barber, meanwhile, believes that this is ‘a story that needed to be told’. He comments, ‘Yes, there is violence but it’s not glamorized in any way, or stylized. It’s not a vigilante movie like Death Wish. The violence in the film is born of the situation and it is treated in a very matter-of-fact way with the cast that we’ve got.
That it has one of the greatest actors ever in the history of cinema in it bears some testimony to the fact. Michael thinks it is important to be in it and we have attracted such a strong cast to play alongside him.
‘I am not a violent person at all but it’s a great story and I am pleased that our hero is a 76-year-old man who you assume would not harm a fly, and for me this film is set against the backdrop of serious fucking issues. Let’s all pretend that the biggest problems we have now are banks.
That is just bullshit. One of the biggest problems we have, and I am not just saying it because I am making this film, is the rise of violence and drug-related crime in this country. It’s a huge problem
Barber continues ‘Yes, everyone is worried that they are not earning any money, but my main concern is that I am a father and I have got a boy and if he is going to go out, I am worried. When I went out as a kid, my parents were pretty sure I would come home.
Nowadays, kids can sell drugs and earn two grand a day so why are they going to get a regular job? The film is about an uncomfortable subject and if people won’t go and see it because there’s violence in it, they can bury their heads in the sand but it’s something that they should go and see, a story that should be told.
That’s why Michael Caine is in it, and that’s why all the other people are in it. That’s why I wanted to be a part of making it. I didn’t have to make it.’
Harry Brown is out now.
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