Ronan Vibert, Vibertology, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid, Kureshi, Frears
~  Sammy and Rosie Get Laid
UK Movie 1987     Ronan content: approx  .3%   (98 mins)
Character: Max, Partygoer
Cast: Shashi Kapoor Raffi,Claire Bloom Rosie, Ayub Khan Din Sammy,Roland Gift 'Victoria'
Director: Stephen Frears        Writer: Hanif Kureshi
Availablity: Deleted. PAL and NTSC copies on Amazon Z-shops, etc. for around £14.99 and $4.99 respectively.
Plot/Comments:
My Beautiful Laundrette was always going to be a hard act to follow for Hanif Kureshi, but Sammy and Rosie just doesn't come close.
   Sammy (Indian British) and Rosie (white British) are the ideal fashionable middle class 80s couple who live in a slum: good-looking, witty, clever, well-read, and with the requisite Bohemian circle of artists, hardcore lesbians, writers, etc. as friends. Their open marriage is based on "commitment + freedom", but it soon becomes clear that while the love definitely remains, everything else has gone, and Rosie (a good  performance by Claire Bloom) in particular is looking for a way out.
   Raffi, Sammy's estranged dictator-politician father arrives from India wanting to re-establish family ties, and much of the film is seen through his reactions of returning to a London which is now "twinned with Beruit". Shashi Kappoor's  performance makes this film worth seeing: in his scenes, Kureshi offers up some good lines, showing an ironic contrast to 'civilised' Britain/impoverished India.
The film's strengths lie in the scenes where Raffi explores his Third World London, rife with race riots, slums, and artistic wannabees who "view world culture as a department store -- you pick a little bit of whatever takes your interest". Some of this is laid on a little thick, but it is an 80s film and anti-Thatcherism must be spelt out very clearly: an effective, but overdone example being the demolition of a squatter's camp to make way for YUPPIE flats, paired with the soundtrack to Maggie's infamous 'Beatitudes' speech.
As a study into an impoverished, violent, facistic Britain seen through the eyes of a middle class Indian, this could have worked. Unfortunately the central relationship between Sammy and Rosie lets the script down. Kureshi and Frears just don't seem interested in them, and neither are the audience. 
 
 

Ronan content: 
Atrue extra in the background of the party scene. What can be said? Short, sensible hair again, though less tidy than Empire State. He glugs a can of stout (think Guinness) with gusto.

n.It is possible that his part was cut right down: 
the resume entry for the character gives a name (Max).
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Trivia
  • Writer/actress Meera Syal from comedy series Goodness Gracious Me appears as one of the agitator lesbians