RT 95%

Harris Dickinson, the consistently exciting star of Beach Rats, Triangle of Sadness, and Babygirl, takes an impressive leap behind the camera with Urchin. The actor’s directorial debut – one of three from this year’s Cannes film festival, alongside the efforts of Kristen Stewart and Scarlett Johansson – is a simultaneously gritty and surreal portrait of a man clinging to recovery. Set in the less salubrious corners of east London, Urchin follows Mike (Frank Dillane), a homeless addict whose attempts at stability and sobriety are constantly undone by old habits and a society all too willing to let him slip through the cracks. Dillane, best known for roles in Fear the Walking Dead and Harry Potter, gives a revelatory performance as the twitchy, unpredictable but often charming hero.-Irish Times

“Harris Dickinson might be the most exciting new auteur since the Safdie Brothers. The future of British social realism looks promising thanks to his debut–knows his Ken Loach and Mike Leigh inside and out but doesn’t carbon-copy what came before.”-Elle