Urchin

On the streets of London, Mike is hustling to get by. Roadside evangelizers won’t let him sleep in peace, his slippery friend won’t pay up the money he stole, and before long, he finds himself in trouble with the law. As he struggles to reintegrate into society, shuffling between gigs as a line cook and a trash collector, he must balance a newfound sense of community with his own itch for self-destruction.

Slyly funny and imbued with a warm humanity, Harris Dickinson’s thrilling directorial debut follows Mike, played with tragic charm and a visceral magnetism by Cannes prize-winner Frank Dillane, in a propulsive portrait of life on the margins that offers a raw, anarchic snapshot of a slow tumble into oblivion.

“Ably navigating back-and-forth tonal shifts between hopeful everyday comedy and stomach-knotting anxiety, Dickinson’s script resists overly tidy shaping, accepting one man’s unreliable id as its primary motor.” — Guy Lodge, Variety

“Since his big-screen breakthrough in Eliza Hittman’s ‘Beach Rats,’ Dickinson (who’s not yet 30) has mostly skipped the standard pretty-boy route of rom-coms and action hero vehicles in favor of working with idiosyncratic directors like Joanna Hogg, Ruben Östlund, Sean Durkin, Halina Reijn and Steve McQueen. (He’s slated to play John Lennon in Sam Mendes’ tetralogy of Beatles movies.) Those shoots appear to have functioned as an informal film school, equipping him to tackle a much-trafficked subject in ways that are thoughtful, distinctive and clearly culled from close study of a highly specific world.” — David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter