After phenomenal successes on TV and in cinema with Peaky Blinders and Oppenheimer, Cillian Murphy has leverage in the film industry. But what to do with it?
Murphy has gone for hardcore social realism. Big themes. Provocative and vital stories. Low-budget, high-quality storytelling with a political edge. And it’s paying off.
New Netflix film Steve is a depiction of a chaotic day in the life of a ramshackle reform school for permanently excluded boys, a place just about held together by Murphy’s empathetic and inspirational leader. He plays a sensitive teacher driven to the edge by a combination of painkiller addiction and the chronic pain inflicted by the continual underfunding of his last-chance reform school for teenage boys excluded from education. Anyone who worked in public serves in the austerity era or Thatcher-Major years will relate.
Cillian Murphy is more open to talking about politics than expected. In this wee’s Big Issue, he tells us what he really thinks.
What else is in this week’s Big Issue?
How Marmot is nursing the nation back to health
When he was a fresh, dynamic leader of the opposition, Keir Starmer frequently referenced and praised Marmot principles on poverty, health and joined-up thinking to regenerate Britain. As inequalities grow, and government spending faces massive pressures, should he turn again? In our deep dive into what Marmot means, the creator Sir Michael Marmot lays out his vision, and we look at the places where this has changed lives.
Our hidden homelessness eight-page special
While homelessness might conjure up the image of someone bedding down in a shop doorway, the reality is that they are the minority. Thousands of people live in temporary accommodation supplied by local authorities. Others have called on the council for help to avoid becoming homeless. But those are just the cases we know about. There’s also another group of people experiencing homelessness who have fallen through the cracks. Out of sight, out of mind. In this supplement, we dive into it.
