A Song of Good

A Song of Good is the story of Gary, a kid from a deprived working-class background who has sunk down in a pool of drugs, violence and superficial sex and is one day confronted with his own conscience. After breaking in by the woman next door, whom he rapes to his own horror, he decides to change his life for the better. That isn't easy in a motherless, superficially completely indifferent family, with a circle of friends who can't think any further than the next intoxicating party and in the company of dealers who aren't interested in good resolutions. Director Gregory King however doesn't choose to use melodrama, but black humour larded with very authentic characterisations of the bare suburb where Gary's life is set with sophisticated and vitriolic details. For instance he has his protagonist commit a burglary wearing a pink smiling balaclava helmet and in the end it's a slogan on a billboard that makes Gary realise that somewhere inside him is an opportunity for a better life and that he himself bears the responsibility for this. The irony interwoven in the characters themselves helps the social commentary in the film to avoid acquiring the tone of an easy social indictment and in the end A Song of Good becomes a tender study of an emotional twenty-something who can hardly cope with his own dream of a better life. (EH)