Underbelly UK: the 1990s underclass film, masculinity and the ideologies of ‘new’ Britain

Abstract

While there is much discussion about how cinema can reinforce national identity, it can also very effectively challenge national identity: far from confirming it, film can point out contradictions or the frailties of perception; it can unveil discord or division. As a culture industry, it is not so much a medium of true nationhood, more a jeu sans frontières , happily taking money and personnel from wherever it can if that means all the difference between mere intention and final execution. The higher the budget, the more the American market looms, the more this applies. Often it raises the question, to what country does this film belong? For the cause of the true nation there is no comforting rhyme or reason. Some of England's most successful heritage movies have been made by a writer from a Jewish-Polish family living much of her life in India, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, a producer from that same country, Ismail Merchant, who now lives in New York along with James Ivory, the American director completing the triangle. 1 What is essentially English about any of them? Very little. Yet they are gifted in the art of screening English fiction and Ivory is especially effective in bringing out the best in his English actors.

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