Honest
UK/France 2000
Reviewed by Andy Richards
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
London, 1969. East End girl Gerry Chase and her sisters Mandy and Jo commit a masked robbery, disguised as men. Gerry cases a jewellery store on Carnaby Street by pretending to look for work at Zero, a radical magazine edited by aristocrat Andrew Pryce-Stevens whose offices are adjacent to the store. She catches the eye of Daniel, an American student trying his hand at journalism. Meanwhile, mob boss Duggie is trying to establish the identity of the thieves. Dressed as men, the sisters rob the jewellers; the last to make her getaway, Gerry is discovered in the Zero office by Daniel who is working late. Daniel unmasks Gerry and puts her up for the night in his flat.
The following day Andrew arrives and offers Gerry and Daniel some fairy cakes spiked with hallucinogens. Having unwittingly eaten these drugs, Gerry gets high, loses the gems and sleeps with Daniel. Mandy and Jo rob a West End club; the heist goes awry and Mandy accidentally shoots Jo in the leg.
Meanwhile, Duggie has worked out that the sisters are behind the robberies and demands the gems. Gerry's father tells her that Duggie was responsible for her mother's death and testifies to the police against him. Duggie is arrested. Daniel discovers that Andrew has a stash of drug money hidden in an artwork; the girls hold up the art gallery where the piece is on display and steal the cash. They flee to France, pursued by Andrew's drug dealer who has a claim on the stolen cash. After subduing their pursuer, Daniel and Gerry drive off together.
Review
With the Austin Powers films still fresh in the public consciousness, Honest's first-time director and co-writer David Stewart's venture into 60s swinging London seems particularly ill-advised. Along with writing partners Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, Stewart has melded his personal memories of the era with staple elements from the caper and kitchen-sink genres. The distinctly uncomfortable results leave you wondering just how seriously Honest takes itself. It may be that the stilted acting and wretched dialogue are somehow intentional - a parody of a quaint strain of British cinema, missing only a Robin Askwith cameo. But if, as Stewart's quotes to the press would seem to indicate, Honest is meant to be a realistic portrayal of 60s London, then audiences are faced with one of the most laughably inept films of recent memory.
Starring as the Chase sisters, Nicole and Natalie Appleton and Melanie Blatt (best known as members of the British pop group All Saints) set themselves a more formidable challenge than their girl-band forerunners the Spice Girls, whose Spice World was canny enough to limit itself to a playful dissection of the performers' public personae. In contrast, the All Saints' acting inexperience leads to some excruciating moments as they struggle with conventionally dramatic roles. No doubt the band's young fans would make a more charitable appraisal - if only Honest's adult content hadn't placed it beyond their legal reach.
While the publicised nudity and drug-taking will help the band define themselves against their squeaky-clean peers, Honest takes a conservative, even prudish, stance on sex. There are a number of repellent promiscuous characters, including Jonathan Cake's decadent aristocrat Andrew and a lesbian hippie whom Chase sister Gerry treats with disgust. Gerry's hesitant attitude towards Daniel, meanwhile, culminates in a kitsch soft-focus riverside love scene. More troubling is a discernible vein of misogyny, notably in the use and abuse of the 'artwork' in which Andrew's drug money is hidden (a female mannequin, looking like a reject from A Clockwork Orange). Not only does this mannequin have a secret compartment between its legs which Andrew and Daniel both rummage in, it ends up being hurled through a window and, in a moment relished in close-up, run over by several cars. The subplot involving the domestic abuse endured by the Chases' female neighbour seems similarly gratuitous, as does sister Mandy's lascivious offers of sexual favours.
Honest would be easier to forgive had it been breezier and more knowing. It may be that its sporadic moments of unintentional hilarity spawn a cult following. Were the film to be remarketed along the lines of Showgirls, Honest might even find its true home among the late-night crowd, who could give such lines as "I want to tell you about the night your mum died... It wasn't no gas explosion, Gerry" the treatment they so richly deserve.
Credits
- Director
- David A. Stewart
- Producers
- Eileen Gregory
- Michael Peyser
- Screenplay
- David A. Stewart
- Dick Clement
- Ian La Frenais
- Karen Street
- Director of Photography
- David Johnson
- Editor
- David Martin
- Production Designer
- Michael Pickwoad
- Music
- David A. Stewart
- ©Honest Productions Limited
- Production Companies
- Pathé Entertainment presents a Seven Dials Films production in association
- with Pandora
- Developed with the support of the European Script Fund
- Executive Producer
- Keith Northrop
- Co-executive Producers
- Dick Clement
- Ian La Frenais
- Line Producer
- Paul Sarony
- Associate Producer
- Tim Palmer
- Production Manager
- Kora McNulty
- Location Manager
- David Broder
- Assistant Directors
- Simon Hinkly
- Toby Hosking
- Rebecca Symons
- 2nd Unit:
- Anthony Wilcox
- Mark Gutteridge
- Script Supervisor
- Elaine Matthews
- 2nd Unit Continuity
- Eleanor Wright
- Casting
- Director:
- Karen Lindsay-Stewart
- US Director:
- Randi Hiller
- ADR Voices:
- Brendan Donnison
- Lyps Inc
- 2nd Unit Director of Photography
- Howard Smith
- 2nd Unit Camera Operators
- Tony Jackson
- Aerial:
- Simon Werry
- Special Effects Supervisor
- Tom Harris
- Art Director
- Henry Harris
- Storyboard Artist
- Douglas Ingram
- Costume Designer
- Mary-Jane Reyner
- Wardrobe Mistress
- Nicole Young
- 2nd Unit Wardrobe
- Suzi Stokes
- Jo Wright
- Rachel Turner
- Sandra Milman
- Martin Milman
- Chief Make-up/Hair Designer
- Pam Haddock
- Make-up Artist
- Alison Davies
- 2nd Unit Make-up
- Jacqui Hodgson
- Christoff Roche-Gordon
- Jane Tyler
- Sue Black
- Michelle Davidson-Bell
- Body Painter/Prosthetics
- Geoff Portass
- Hairdresser
- Paula Price
- Title Design
- Richard Morrison
- Fig Productions
- Title/Opticals/End Credits
- General Screen Enterprises
- Opticals
- Cinesite
- Music Performed by
- London Metropolitan Orchestra
- The Score Band
- Vocal/Guitar/Bass/
- Drums:
- Bootsy Collins
- Guitar:
- David A. Stewart
- Drums/Programming:
- Steve McLaughlin
- Keyboards:
- Teese Gohl
- Music Orchestrations/
Conductor - Teese Gohl
- Music Producers
- Teese Gohl
- Steve McLaughlin
- Music Recordist/Mixer
- Steve McLaughlin
- Motown Music Consultant
- Harry Weinger
- Soundtrack
- "Rainy DayWomen", "Love Minus Zero", "4th Time Around", "One of Us Must Know" - Bob Dylan; "You're All I Need to Get By", "Ain't Nothing Like the Real Thing" - Marvin Gaye, Tammi Terrell; "See Saw" - Don Covay; "Reflections", "Stop! In the Name of Love" - Beverley Skeete, Claudia Fontaine, Faye Simpson; "Turn into Earth" - Al Stewart; "Tracks of My Tears" - Smokey Robinson & The Miracles; "Mr Know It All", "Little Miss Understood" - The Sires; "Ain't No Stopping" - Bootsy Collins, Steve Lewinson, Pete Lewinson; "Take a Stroll thru Your Mind" - The Temptations; "Pie Jesu" from Faure's "Requiem" - Chamber Philharmonic of Bohemia Puerl Guadentes; "Itchycoo Park" - Small Faces; "Suddenly" - Billy Ternent &His Orchestra; "J'aime les filles" - Jacques Dutronc; "You're All I Need to Get By" - Natalie Appleton, Bootsy Collins
- Choreography
- Caroline Pope
- Sound Recordist
- Alistair Crocker
- Sound Mixers
- Mike Prestwood-Smith
- 2nd Unit:
- Jeff Hawkins
- Geoff Tookey
- Alistair Widgery
- Supervising Sound Editor
- Nigel Mills
- Dialogue Editors
- Gillian Dodders
- Mark Heslop
- ADR
- Artists:
- Daniel Flynn
- Daniel Marinker
- DeNica Fairman
- Sharon Gavin
- Julia Brams
- Mixers:
- Ted Swanscott
- Terry Isted
- Editor:
- Gillian Dodders
- Foley
- Artists:
- Stan Fiferman
- Ruth Sullivan
- Mixer:
- Kevin Tayler
- Editor:
- Ben Barker
- Stunt Co-ordinators
- Nicholas Powell
- Motorbike Sequence:
- Lex Milloy
- Armourers
- Gregg Pearson
- Steve Wilkerson
- Alan Long
- Perdix Firearms
- 2nd Unit Helicopter Pilot
- Paul Moran
- Cast
- Nicole Appleton
- Gerry Chase
- Peter Facinelli
- Daniel Wheaton
- Natalie Appleton
- Mandy Chase
- Melanie Blatt
- Jo Chase
- James Cosmo
- Tommy Chase
- Jonathan Cake
- Andrew Pryce-Stevens
- Rick Warden
- Baz
- Annette Badland
- Rose
- Sean Gilder
- The Hawk
- Corin Redgrave
- Duggie Ord
- Paul Rider
- Mo
- Sam Kelly
- Uncle Sid Gallin
- Matt Bardock
- Cedric
- Tony Maudsley
- Chopper
- Derek Deadman
- night watchman
- Graham Fletcher-Cook
- market trader
- Vinny Reed
- stills photographer
- Renata Habelinková
- Karina Iszatt
- body painted girls
- Willie Ross
- Woodbine
- Lynn Ferguson
- Loretta
- Bobby Bluebell
- Terry the Tripps
- Declan Conlon
- Eddie
- John Pearson
- mechanic
- Jayne Ashbourne
- Nadja
- Helen Slaymaker
- Marianne
- Ferdy Roberts
- Jake
- The Sires
- 1st band on stage at Tripps Festival
- Deepak Chopra
- poetry reader
- Mark Healy
- waiter
- Bill Mannix
- MC at ballroom dance
- Bootsy Collins
- Steve Lewinson
- Pete Lewinson
- band 2 inside Tripps Festival
- Ross Gurney-Randall
- man counting money in club
- Susannah Fellows
- Birdie Wheaton
- Rolf Saxon
- Alden Wheaton
- Chrissie Cotterill
- June Ord
- Grant Russell
- cop
- Heathcote Williams
- professor
- Charlotte Roach
- desk nurse
- Paul Corrigan
- uniformed cop
- Robert Vahey
- Munton
- Graham Seed
- pseud in art gallery
- Georgina Sowerby
- woman in art gallery
- Sam
- Django
- Rory
- children at campsite
- Certificate
- 18
- Distributor
- Pathé Distribution
- 9,905 feet
- 110 minutes 3 seconds
- Dolby Digital Surround-Ex
- Colour by
- DeLuxe