I Know You Know Review

The press release for I Know You Know describes the film as both a ‘touching coming of age movie’ and a ‘British father and son thriller’. From the cover art on the DVD, which depicts a furious Robert Carlyle brandishing a gun and newcomer Aaron Fuller running frantically, you might expect to find a ‘gritty’ action adventure inside. In truth, I Know You Know does not fit neatly into any genre in particular and carves its own niche.

In late 80s Cardiff, Charlie (Carlyle) and his son Jamie (Fuller) are on the run. Charlie is undercover, on a secret mission that revolves around the presumably nefarious activities of new satellite television company. Whilst Charlie goes about his top secret business, Jamie spends time at his Uncle Ernie’s house and enrols at a new school, waiting for his father to complete his mission, after which the pair will relocate to America and live off the substantial wage Charlie will earn. Things become inevitably more complicated and soon Jamie begins to question his father’s motives.

Initially, I found I Know You Know frustrating; its shifts in tone, from buoyant father and son drama to mysterious spy thriller via schoolyard mishaps and back again seemed annoying and inconsistent. Guy Farley’s score is at times truly dreadful, a shamelessly unsubtle attempt to conjure emotional reactions through clichéd and trite piano passages. I also think the title is pretty rubbish.

There is a more than substantial bright side though. Robert Carlyle, perhaps one of the most charismatic screen presences working today, channels the erratic danger of Begbie into his performance, leaving the audience on tenterhooks as to which way his manic energy will send the scene. First-time actor Aaron Fuller is also good and proves very capable in role that demands a lot of narrative-carrying responsibility.

The drama takes interesting twists and turns, and director Justin Kerrigan, whose late father the film is partly based on and dedicated to, portrays South Wales in an atmospheric and uncomforting manner. In contrast to the dingy suburbs in which most of the action takes place are the father and son’s dream of American escape. Jamie constantly wears a New York Giants baseball cap and basketball vests while Charlie is enamoured with space travel and has a poster of a NASA shuttle launch. Their desperate surroundings and situations turn these longings into cruel jokes, the irony made all the more cutting by the film’s deeply moving ending.

While difficult to get into at first, I Know You Know proved to be a satisfying and sad viewing by the final scene. A serious and highly commendable film that refuses to be pigeon-holed.

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