My Beautiful Laundrette

Plot synopsis:
Omar Ali is a young man living in Battersea in the Wandsworth area of South London, right by the railway station during the mid-1980s. His father, Hussein (known to the rest of the family as Papa), once a famous left-wing British Pakistani journalist in Bombay, lives in London but hates Britain's society and its international politics. His dissatisfaction with the world and a family tragedy have led him to sink into alcoholism, so that Omar has to be his caregiver. By contrast, Omar's paternal uncle Nasser is a successful entrepreneur and an active member of the London Pakistani community. Papa asks Nasser to give Omar a job and, after working for a brief time as a car washer in one of his uncle's garages, he is assigned the task of managing a run-down laundrette and turning it into a profitable business.
At Nasser's, Omar meets a few other members of the Pakistani community: Tania, Nasser's daughter and possibly a future bride; and Salim, who trafficks drugs and hires him to deliver them from the airport. While driving Salim and his wife home that night, the three of them get attacked by a group of right-wing extremist street punks. Their apparent leader turns out to be Johnny, Omar's childhood friend. Omar tries to reestablish their past friendship, offering Johnny a job and the opportunity to adopt a better life by working to fix up the laundrette with him. Johnny decides to help with the laundrette and they resume a romantic relationship that (it is implied) had been interrupted after school. Running out of money, Omar and Johnny sell one of Salim's drug deliveries to make cash for the laundrette's substantial renovation.
On the opening day of the laundrette, Omar confronts Johnny on his fascist past. Johnny, feeling guilty, tells him that though he cannot make it up to him, he is with him now. Nasser visits the laundrette with his mistress, Rachel. As they dance together in the laundrette, Omar and Johnny make love in the back room, narrowly escaping discovery. At the inauguration, Tania confronts Rachel about having an affair with her father. Rachel accuses Nasser of having invited Tania on purpose to have her insulted, and storms off despite his protests. Later that night, a drunk Omar proposes to Tania, who accepts on the condition that he raise money to get away. Soon after, Salim reveals to Omar that he is on to them, and demands his money back. Omar's father stops by late in the night and appeals to Johnny to persuade Omar to go to college because he is unhappy with his son running a laundrette.
Offering Salim a chance to invest in his businesses as a much needed 'clean outlet' for his money, Omar decides to take over two laundrettes owned by a friend of Nasser. Salim drives Johnny and Omar to view one of the properties, and he expresses his dislike of the British non-working punks in Johnny's gang. He attempts to run them over and injures one of them. Meanwhile, Rachel falls ill with a skin rash apparently caused by a ritual curse from Nasser's wife, and decides it is best for all that she and Nasser part ways. The next day Tania drops by the laundrette and tells Johnny she is leaving, asking him to come along. He refuses, implicitly revealing the truth about himself and Omar and she departs wordlessly. After Salim arrives and enters the laundrette, the punks, who had been lying in wait, trash his car. When he runs out on noticing them, he is ambushed and viciously attacked. Johnny decides to interrupt and defend him, despite their mutual dislike, and the punks turn their attention to him instead. As he refuses to fight back, they beat him savagely until Omar returns and intervenes, protecting Johnny as the punks trash the laundrette and flee the scene.
Nasser visits Papa, and the two discuss their respective failures, agreeing between them that only Omar's future matters now. Nasser sees Tania at the train platform while she is running away, and he shouts to her but she disappears. Meanwhile, at the laundrette, Omar nurses Johnny, and the two bond. The film ends with a scene of them shirtless, playfully splashing each other with water from a sink, implying that they are continuing their relationship together.

Tags: violence, psychedelic, romantic

Review:
It's about the characters, rather than a social message (but that's there too).'My Beautiful Laundrette' mainly centres around Omar and his relationship with Johnny.
Daniel Day-Lewis and Gordon Warnecke are excellent as Johnny and Omar.
A classic film in my book, My Beautiful Laundrette is the story of Omar, a young restless Asian man caring for his alcoholic father in Thatcherite London.
Similarly I am sure Asian viewers will recognise the struggles inherent in finding an identity in a country which is your home but which can never feel quite like your real home.Omar dreams of success so works to achieve it...along the way he meets up with old school-friend Johnny, who has betrayed him by falling in with a group of neo-nazi's.
Omar never makes a scene.That's what Johnny represents I think, the part of us we keep to ourselves, our passions and desire and those things that are too special to share, kind of like a spiritual belief.
It's very sweet and tender with the frantic kissing and the champange, but my god is it hot.This certainly is a romantic (and more importantly) positive movie where two men are in love yet have a real conflict between them, and obviously gay men are right to love that, but hey, it works for informing white people, making minorities laugh, British people who grew up during that time, showing idiot homophobes that gay people are just the same as everyone else, DDL fans.
The realism is a scrupulously observed portrait of 80s London, its people (entrepreneurs, drunks, racists, wide-boys), locales (dingy flats, delapidated laundrettes, murky car lots) and attitudes (strutting capitalism, dessicated liberalism, farcical extremism).The magic comes from Frears' style, tweaking and heightening the real; from stylised scenes such as Omar's reuniting with Johnny; from some magical set-pieces, especially the opening of the laundrette, Omar and Johnny making love cut with Nasser and Rachel's waltz; from the clashing of an exotic, Oriental world in a determinedly materialist context.
That said, Daniel Day Lewis lends a powerful presence to his role as the punk squatter, Johnny.The climax of the film aptly integrates the various tensions in the film: political, sexual, and social.
He gets in his white mate Johnny (Daniel Day Lewis) to give him a hand and the two guys fall in love.My Beautiful Laundrette completely encapsulates the zeitgeist of 1980's Britain, tackling everything from racial tension, immigration, generation differences, class differences, Thatcherism and homosexuality.
It's a light romantic comedy that lets us see the violence and racism but doesn't linger, making it more powerful when things do happen.As for the relationship between Omar and Johnny, it's portrayed very tenderly (and very sexily, though tasteful).
It's just portrayed as a normal loving relationship and the two actors- both straight- are very convincing.Now Daniel Day Lewis has bagged his third Oscar, breaking the record for Best Actor, how does he fare in a very early film in his career?
Gordon Warneke and Daniel Day-Lewis play the lovers in this intelligent movie which has a cheap British tinge but has some superb moments (Saeed Jaffrey as Warneke's uncle, a professional businessman, not a professional Pakistani') within it.
The first generation then deal and resolve this in their own lives (easing the tension where necessary, with a little help from Daniel), and what better setting than 1980's London, when squatting was a plenty (that is the famous Bonnington Square you see in the movie), Housing Associations, Community Arts, UB40 discounts and other things of the past were just getting axed.
So says Saeed Jaffrey, easily one of the most recognisable Indian actors, at the film's start and sets the tone for this early Film 4 offering from 1985 as the wheeler-dealer uncle, and who typified Thatcherism's era of entrepreneurial immigrants.Radio Times awards a rare five stars for this provocative and ground- breaking film from the now hugely successful director, now, of Stephen Frears and of course, for Daniel Day Lewis, it might have been his last, presumably such a contentious issue inter-racial gay sex would have been seen (and still viewed as), had he not been both brave AND very good.This was just Frear's second feature film and whilst today the production values lag, many of the scenes are (necessarily?) contrived and the acting variable, it still says a lot.
Omar, being one of Thatcher's mass army of 3 million unemployed takes to the challenge and equally unemployed white, former National Front member Johnny (Day-Lewis), a schoolfriend of Omar's get drafted in to help refit the run-down laundrette and to turn it into a Palace full of washing machines.As you can imagine, Johnny's past friends find much to dislike about the company he now keeps, especially as he's been to prison for his past activities and now is not only only cohorting with the Front's seen enemy but having unbridled, active sex with one who is the same sex.
Issues around the pressure for Omar to get married, by arrangement are very relevant, both as in being Pakistani and homosexual.For my money, there are just too many small characters, doing little things that we never see again; they do not contribute to the film and if anything, dissolve its strengths.
Omar may actually have spoken like that but it fails to convince.The romance element is boosted by the way that the refurbished laundrette is to be launched as a dreamy magical palace, with a razzle- dazzle showbiz look and can be seen as the aspiration for people who have little to make a life for themselves.I first saw My Beautiful Laundrette about when it was released and knew friends in the gay community - and have watched the DVD a couple of times since.
And, through some very underhanded means, Omar and his friend Johnny (Daniel Day-Lewis) make the place a success.
It's mostly about Omar and his life as a Pakistani in Britain; a great deal of it is about families, their bonds, and their conflicts; significant parts of it are about Omar's relationship with Johnny, which means that the film is dealing with a lot of material.
As terrific as Daniel Day-Lewis is in this film it really belongs to actor Gordon Warnecke as Omar.
The film that launched Stephen Frear's career, "My Beautiful Laundrette" was originally only released for British TV., yet it was so immensely popular that it was subsequently re-released for the cinema years later.Saeed Jaffrey, Daniel Day Lewis, Roshan Seth and all the supporting cast perform well in this insightful drama of racial tensions, forbidden love and South London culture.
In the end, it's a movie that wants to be about being gay, but also about being Pakistani in London, but also about being a white thug / homeless young guy in 80s London, but also about being a young closeted guy, and also about a guy turning an old business into a new shiny one, while also being about drug dealers, and about standing up to your community for love (a la Romeo and Juliette).
But Johnny's friends HATE Pakistanis and the class differences between Omar and Johnny threaten to tear them apart.This is often called a gay movie but I disagree.
Critically acclaimed, My Beautiful Laundrette is a true masterpiece of British cinema, a remarkable film detailing a collide of cultures, minds and values set against a backdrop of Thatcher's troubled and dysfunctional Britain.
Directed by Stephen Frears and written by Hanif Kureishi, My Beautiful Laundrette took the world by storm in 1985/86 for its portrayal of gay love, homophobia, racism, capitalism and colliding cultures in such a vibrant and honest way.
It seemed to come with such authentic honesty that many at the time believed it must have come from the mind of a gay man; however, Hanif Kureishi the writer was a heterosexual male with an incredible vision and remarkable ability.Essentially this is the story of life, love and passion, a love story set during rapidly changing society during a time of great differences between those that have and those that didn't and those trying to moving between the two.Described like this, it is perhaps hard to see why it was such an important and landmark film, yet it managed to encapsulate all the tensions of the economically troubled times with panache and tenacious realistic style.
My Beautiful Laundrette remains to this day a wonderful and remarkable piece of British cinema.Read more and find out where this film made it in the Top 50 Most Influential Gay Movies of All Time book, search on Amazon for Top 50 Most Influential Gay Movies of All Time, or visit - http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007FU7HPO.
The focus is on a diverse gay couple (not only racially diverse, either): tough-guy Johnny (Daniel Day Lewis in a career-best performance) and initially naive, star-reaching Omar (Gordon Warnecke, likewise).
What it doesn't have is a budget, making the film look and sound like a cheap made-for-TV movie, hardly surprising since it was, in fact, produced for British television (a remarkably permissive institution, by American network standards at the time).
But it all ends happily ever after, doubly so for director Stephan Frears and actor Daniel Day-Lewis, who were both catapulted into the international arena by the film's success..
Two eccentric protagonists, Johnny and Omar, running such an ordinary business like a launderette, is a major factor to distill the film's offbeat quality.There are several interesting shots.
"My Beautiful Laundrette," released in 1985, is many things: a study of Britain in the '80s, a class story, the story of Pakistanis trying to assimilate, and a gay love story.
Somehow it succeeds on all levels.Omar (Gordon Warnecke) is a young Pakistani living in England and caring for his alcoholic, very ill father Hussein (Roshan Seth), once an important journalist whose left leanings haven't gone over very well in Britain.
Hussein intends for Omar to go to college, but in the meantime, he wants his brother Nasser (Saeed Jaffrey), who runs many businesses with his right hand man Salim (Derrick Branche), to give Omar a job.Omar is ambitious and eventually asks his uncle to let him run the filthy, graffiti-ridden laundrette and make it profitable.
And Johnny has no compunction about seducing Omar.One of the things that makes this film fascinating is the treatment of the gay theme, which is not really treated as a theme at all but merely as information about these two young men.
It's also about racial hatred and the violence it causes.The film is peppered with interesting characters: Nasser's glamorous white mistress (Shirley Anne Field), Nasser's daughter Tania (Rita Wolf), and the volatile Salim.The film is beautifully photographed, particularly in the romantic scenes...Johnny kissing Omar in the alley is but one example.The acting --- well, what can be said about acting where Daniel Day-Lewis has a supporting role?
Frears, with a good sense of these characters, manages to create a world that is gritty and surreal at the same time; still, he gets the film off to such a slipshod start that many viewers might not have the patience to allow the story to build.
There wasn't any sign of a gay love story in the film before!" Probably the author(Hanif Kureishi)of the book tried to make his work more interesting.
Omar hires Johnny to work for him.Director Stephen Frears brings some of the new Pakistani flavor into his London movie.
I like the way the film really does not make a big deal about two good looking sexy guys in love, but focuses more on racism and class issues that plague the UK...and US!
Playing a gay character early in his career certainly did not sabotage Daniel Day-Lewis' success in films.
Daniel Day Lewis who used to wander the streets with his fascist mates meet Omar, a Pakistanian immigrant who is supposed to study at the uni but due to his  uncle (a man who is earning money in his way) but ends up working for him as he is totally blinded by the good lifestyle of his uncle.
An ambitious Asian Briton and his white lover strive for success and hope, when they open up a glamorous laundromat."My Beautiful Laundrette" was Stephen Frears' third feature film for the cinema.
I have never seen a relationship in film that comes close to the classic, inspiring, well-known pair of Johnny and Omar.Johnny, who seemingly takes the lead in their sexual and romantic relationship, is a white, rough-and-tumble street punk caught up in a small gang and going nowhere.
Omar is a bright-eyed, handsome Pakistani boy who takes care of his father, and when a taste of work comes his way, wants nothing more than "big money" and to prove the country he lives in will not beat him.
I have never seen any bit of film quite as passionate, honest nor as erotic as the scene where Johnny and Omar make love.
I won't say too much aside from that I thought the ending was sweet and it took me by surprise, not bothering with a few loose ties if only to inspire lovely ambiguity.There is much more to "My Beautiful Laundrette" than Johnny and Omar's romantic relationship, but the symbolism it serves - as representing the hopeful future, their business, how the world sees them - relates to all aspects of the film.
Daniel Day-Lewis and Gordon Warnecke's performances alone are enough of a reason to give it a watch.If you'd like to see a smart, witty, beautiful love story rich in symbolism and more substance than a single review could do justice for, I'd recommend you do yourself a favor by watching "My Beautiful Laundrette.".
The story is about one Pakistani man (Warnecke) and a long time Englishman friend (Day-Lewis) who both live on the wrong side of the tracks as they grope for success in the laundromat business while coping with the usual culture clashing, old school ethnic adult attitudes, their gayness, etc.
Firstly, there is the love affair between the two main characters, Omar and Johnny, brought to life by brilliant performances from both Gordon Warnecke and Daniel Day-Lewis.
But he's never been so on-point, so relevant, direct and just plain right as with his script for Stephen Frears' well-made "My Beautiful Laundrette".Gordon Warnecke plays Omar, a young Pakistani Londoner needing a direction in life in 1980's Britain: time of Thatcher, of aspiration, accumulation.
Omar's world becomes divided between his father, his uncle and his unlikely, erstwhile friend and sometime NF supporter, punk dropout Johnny (an early Daniel Day Lewis).The world of 'Sarf' London in the 80s is brilliantly depicted  from the feel of the streets right down to the fundamental, almost feudal divide between rich and poor.
Johnny's kiss stolen from Omar on a dark street corner is one of the all time sexiest moments I can think of in a film, and I can see from other reviewers that I'm not alone.
(Hardly necessary to add that you don't have to be gay to enjoy this film  any more than that you have to be a Londoner or British.)Daniel Day Lewis has since made his way to superstardom; Gordon Warnecke inexplicably languishes in occasional British TV appearances today, as far as I can tell.
Starring a very young and dashing Daniel Day-Lewis and an relatively unknown but charming Gordon Warnecke, this is a movie set in the 1980s in the UK and deals with the issues of that time.
The two have to deal with the expectations of Omar's family and the snide remarks Johnny's street "friends" make about him working for a Paki.(Also, some people who watched the film got confused about Tania's role in all this??
'My Beautiful Laundrette' centers around a young Pakistani man named Omar (Gordon Warnecke), living in south London during the height of Margaret Thatcher's reign of England.
Omar's father wants him to go to university to get a good education and a great job, rather than working dead end jobs, however Omar takes a shining to his uncle Nasser (Saeed Jaffrey), who runs a few businesses, but isn't the best person to look up to, due to his infidelity.
Uncle Nasser offers Omar to run a local laundry mat he owns and restore it to make a decent profit.As Omar is working at the laundry mat, he comes across an old friend he hasn't seen in years named Johnny (Daniel Day-Lewis), a local skinhead now and part of a gang.
Under the iron curtain of Thatcherism in the 1980s, UK veteran Stephen Frears' fourth feature film is an ethnic barrier-breaker in the world queer cinema, much as its fervid confrontations between races and social classes, the central closeted romance between an ex-punk Johnny (Day-Lewis) and a Pakistani Briton Omar (Warnecke) is nurtured with robust intimacy and élan.
Enclosed by a synth-pop heavy pulse, the film starts with Johnny and his gang being expelled from their squatting apartment by some heavies, a similar territory Daniel Day-Lewis would retread in IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER (1993), then cutting to introduce another protagonist, Omar, a college dropout sent to work for his uncle Nasser (Jaffrey) by his bed-ridden father (Seth), a disillusioned idealist and leftist), in Nasser's car-washing lot, Omar meets Nasser's business partner Salim (Branche), a menacing and overbearing bully who conducts some seedy business and Nasser's mistress Rachel (Anne Field), who assumes a quite modernized view of being the other woman, but the entire entanglement will end up with some ludicrous witchcraft.
Gorden Warnecke plays Omar Ali, the go-getting son of an alcoholic Pakistani father and Daniel Day-Lewis is 'Johnny', an 'ex-thug' who is Omar's on again/off again lover.
A new wrinkle occurs when Omar and his friend suddenly become gay lovers who do a lot of French kissing.Presumably this was meant to be a social message movie, but a contrived storyline and characters we do not like or care about bring things down.
Omar hires his old friend from growing up, outsider Johnny (Daniel Day-Lewis) at first to wash cars in the garage business he also runs, and then to help the running of the laundrette.