Information reaching Kossyderrickent has it that Harry Styles and David Dawson go viral on The Policeman movie after their sex video and nude got leaked. (Read More Here).
I’ve gathered you here today to discuss a matter of the utmost importance. It’s so important that it might even pertain to national security (kidding), but still. The matter is Mr. Harry Edward Styles and his acting skills. Watching Harry in his new movie My Policeman brought me to an epiphany: The man is a neck actor. Yes, that is a term I made up. And yes, I will explain what I mean.
But first, the details. My Policeman, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and launched on Amazon Prime Video today, follows a love triangle in their younger and older years, and the younger group is played by Harry Styles (Tom), David Dawson (Patrick), and Emma Corrin (Marion). Tom and Patrick are in love, but it’s Brighton, England, in the 1950s and being gay is illegal. Tom marries Marion to shield him from the scrutiny he could face as a gay man. It is a quiet and tragic movie full of glances across crowded rooms and intimate moments stolen while other people aren’t looking.
But then there’s Harry Styles, who tries to give a quiet performance to match the film but there’s one big problem: He acts with his neck and his neck only. What I mean by that is instead of reacting to someone with his eyes or his face, he will swivel his head almost nonstop between people and things. I’ll give you an example. There’s a scene in the movie where Tom and Patrick are in a museum staring at a work of art. It’s a scene that establishes their growing feelings for one another even though they can’t really talk about them openly. In the span of a minute-long conversation, Harry moves his head back and forth so often that I almost got whiplash just watching him perform. I kept wanting to shout “Stay still!!!” at the screen.
Maybe it’s because Harry is one of the world’s biggest pop stars and the Harry we see onstage at his concerts, the Harry that grinds and grooves and shakes his lil hips, and yes, even moves his neck to try to find the best signs in the crowd from his 360-degree stage is ultimately the same Harry we are seeing here. His ass quite literally refuses to quit.
Don’t get me wrong. I love Harry Styles. I want Harry Styles to succeed as an actor. And look, I appreciate a career pivot more than anyone else. I think there’s still hope for him. But Harry, my guy, please give your neck a break. You’re going to need physical therapy, and we’re all going to need a Dramamine for the seasickness.
Based on Bethan Roberts’ 2012 novel of the same name, the period drama takes place in 1950s Brighton and follows a torrid love triangle between closeted policeman Tom Burgess (played by Styles), his wife Marion (The Crown’s Emma Corrin), and his lover Patrick Hazelwood (The Last Kingdom’s David Dawson) during a time when homosexuality was illegal in the UK.
Four decades later, older Patrick (Rupert Everett) moves into older Marion (Gina McKee) and older Tom’s (Linus Roach) Peacehaven home after suffering a stroke, and the film cuts between the two time periods in lengthy flashbacks after Marion discovers Patrick’s diaries detailing his love affair with her husband.
While there’s no denying the film takes great care in recognising the tragedy of an era that forced gay people into either suppressing their sexuality or face persecution, it’s merely surface level.
Tom is the prize both Marion and Patrick desire, which is why at first it seems Styles was perfectly cast, as his charisma and star power make him the believable centre of this love triangle.
Beyond this, however, he falls short of conveying the necessary depth and inner turmoil of a repressed gay man torn between the socially accepted (though platonic) love he has for wife, and the heartbreakingly passionate, forbidden one he has for his lover.
Corrin puts in a solid performance as Marion, but it’s Dawson who’s the standout as worldly museum curator Patrick, radiating allure and refinement while permeating the heartache of a closeted life. One particular scene in which Patrick realises it’s not his policeman who has showed up to his work will have you reaching for the tissues.
Styles and Dawson do have chemistry, but the script doesn’t fully develop any of the characters and fails to convey the depth of Tom and Patrick’s emotional connection beyond passionate sex and their attraction to one another. The time-jump also leaves us wondering what’s transpired between them all over the past forty years.
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