Unemployed Britons and their sons live on the dole. Criterion Collection Year 1983 Video Release 1999-01-26 Genre Comedy MPAA Rating Not Rated Color Color Runtime 104 Animated Live-Action Full Synopsis A slow-burning depiction of economic degradation in Thatcher's England, Mike Leigh's Meantime was the culmination of the writer-director's pioneering work in television and became his breakthrough theatrical release. Unemployment is rampant in London's working-class East End, where a middle-aged couple and their two sons languish in a claustrophobic public housing flat. As the brothers Phil Daniels and Tim Roth grow increasingly disaffected, Leigh punctuates the grinding boredom of their daily existence with tense encounters, including with a priggish aunt Marion Bailey who has managed to become middle-class and a blithering skinhead on the verge of psychosis a scene-stealing Gary Oldman, in his first major role . Informed by Leigh's now trademark improvisational process and propelled by the lurching rhythms of its Beckett-like dialogue, Meantime is an unrelenting, often blisteringly funny look at life on the dole. Director Mike Leigh Cast Mike Leigh; Marion Bailey; Phil Daniels; Tim Roth; Pam Ferris; Jeff Robert; Alfred Molina; Gary Oldman; Tilly Vosburgh; Leila Bertrand; Paul Daly