My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)

R11/16/1985Comedy, Drama, Romance1h 38m
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A sharp, sophisticated, funny, sexy, compassionate picture.

Overview

A young Pakistani Briton manages a rundown laundrette with his lover while dealing with tension in his family, the local Pakistani community, and a persistent mob of skinheads.

Top Billed Cast

  1. Cast 1

    Gordon Warnecke

    Omar Ali

  2. Cast 1

    Daniel Day-Lewis

    Johnny Burfoot

  3. Cast 1

    Roshan Seth

    Hussein "Papa" Ali

  4. Cast 1

    Saeed Jaffrey

    Nasser Ali

  5. Cast 1

    Derrick Branche

    Salim N. Ali

  6. Cast 1

    Rita Wolf

    Tania N. Ali

  7. Cast 1

    Souad Faress

    Cherry N. Ali

  8. Cast 1

    Shirley Anne Field

    Rachel

  9. Cast 1

    Richard Graham

    Genghis

This was always my favourite of the early slew of films commissioned by Channel Four. At the time it was trendy to make sure that every film was “edgy” and determined to make some sort of social point about the supposed iniquities of “Thatcherism”. This one is a bit more subtle about that, presenting an hybrid of a love story married with a critique on a racially charged environment in which the thuggish and the venal were almost equally complicit. We meet the handsome young “Omar” (Gordon Warnecke) who has been affectionately looking after his dipso dad (Roshan Seth) for a while until he gets...