Give Us Tomorrow (1978)

Give Us Tomorrow (1978)

A long driver's POV shot of a affluent yet lifeless suburb, the kind that inoffensive 70's sitcoms are usually set in , opens the film. The quiet is soon shattered by the vehicles occupants, two balaclava wearing criminals old lag Ron and a bored, dole queue escapee teenager.

Part of a bank robbery gang Ron and the unnamed kid proceed to hold the family of a bank manager at gunpoint, a blackmailing move to ensure the rest of the gang's raid on his bank goes smoothly. Naturally it doesn't and although the gang get away with the cash a foolish have a go hero employee lays dead in their wake. By the time Ron and the kid have put 2 and 2 together and realized the gang have made off with the loot the police have surrounded the house and a full on hostage situation is on the cards.

Ron passes the time by swearing and getting drunk, the bitter working class crim it transpires has a huge chip on his shoulder about the class system and wastes no time giving his middle class captives a piece of his mind. The other side of the coin is the bank manager's wife, snooty suburban housewife Wendy the sort who'd cross the street to avoid people like Ron, or would just be alarmed if she saw someone like Ron walking down her street at all. You know there's going to be trouble when she tut tuts him for putting a dirty bag on her table and flinches when he calls her 'luv'. Common sense dictates that Wendy should just keep her head down, but if anything the deep class prejudices these two have for each other only causes them up the ante in their snob/slob attitudes. As hard as Winter tries to inject social comment into all this much of Give Us Tomorrow is pretty funny, thanks mainly to the inspired ravings of vulgarian par excellence Ron. Whether its his obscene revision of the saying 'an apple a day keeps old age at bay', or asking Wendy if she wants to "knock off a quick one", one man Derek and Clive record Ron leaves no stone unturned. (IMDB gavcrimson)