CHICAGO FILM FEST ROUNDUP PART II - With 'All or Nothing' (opens Friday in NY/LA), writer/director Mike Leigh ('Naked', 'Secrets & Lies') has given us another celebration of the working class. But don't take my use of the word "celebration" too literally because this movie is so bleak it makes Ingmar Bergman look like he was popping Prozac. As with much of Leigh's previous work and in accordance with his usual method of filmmaking -- he rehearses extensively before filming with only the characters and some scenes in place and develops the final script through improvisational collaboration with his actors -- 'All or Nothing' is an ensemble piece that feels almost more like a cinema verite documentary than a fictional narrative. The "plot" -- or lack thereof -- centers around a group of desperate, depressed individuals living in a London housing estate (read "project"). The primary characters are Penny and Phil Bassett (Lesley Manville and Timothy Spall) and their two kids, Rory and Rachel. Each member of the family is the antithesis of his/her counterpart. Penny incessantly nags and unknowingly belittles her more quiet, introspective husband Phil. Rachel is also quiet, likes to read, and works at a home for elderly folks, while her loud, obese brother Rory is in his 20s but has the mentality of a 12-year-old. He doesn't have a job and spends his days lying on the couch eating, watching TV, and just generally being one of the most obnoxious people you can imagine. While Rory and various other characters who mingle in and out of the story at first provoke laughs with their pitiful behavior, a subtle transformation takes place as the movie progresses. Leigh manages to evoke genuine empathy for these characters by allowing us to witness their lives, the day-to-day struggle simply to get by. Situations or circumstances that might have been funny early on in the movie become less humorous as we start to respect the characters. We no longer laugh "at" them -- as in, "Boy, aren't I glad I have a such a blissful existence sitting in the theater at the Chicago Film Fest watching other people suffer" -- because we start to respect them. After the movie, my wife said she felt it was "directionless" -- referring to the story, not Leigh's actual direction -- and technically she's right. Characters meander through the story without any sort of conventional plot machinations until the last half-hour when a sudden life or death situation arises. But rather than compound the Bassett family's already troubled life, this situation becomes the catalyst for change, for a new life. And Leigh pulls it off without any Hollywood manipulations. The ending is "happy," but not what we would consider a "happy ending." I was genuinely moved by the movie's final cathartic scenes, and I credit Leigh for being able to end on a note of real hope without it seeming inconsistent with who these characters are. Life is never going to be easy for the Bassett family -- is it for anybody? -- but maybe they can make it a little less dreary.

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