The British Film Institute has detailed its upcoming Blu-ray release of director Stephen Frears' film
My Beautiful Laundrette (1985), starring Saeed Jaffrey, Roshan Seth, Daniel Day-Lewis, Stephen Marcus, and Richard Graham. The release will be available for purchase on August 21.
Synopsis: In director Stephen Frears' groundbreaking and hugely successful drama, Omar (Gordon Warnecke), the son of a Pakistani immigrant, embarks on a venture to renovate his uncle's laundrette with the help of his childhood friend, ex-National Front member Johnny (Daniel Day-Lewis).
A commercial and critical success, My Beautiful Laundrette earned Hanif Kureishi an Oscar nomination for Best Screenplay and launched the career of Daniel Day-Lewis, who recently announced his retirement from acting.
The film is being released as part of the BFI's activity (from June onwards) to mark the 50th anniversary of the Sexual Offences Act 1967. This includes a major two month film and TV season, Gross Indecency, and a one month Joe Orton season at BFI Southbank, a new online BFI Player collection – LGBT Britain on Film, a UK-wide touring programme of archive film and an international touring programme of classic LGBT shorts from directors including Derek Jarman, Isaac Julien and Terence Davies.
Special Features and Technical Specs:
- 1986 Q&A at the ICA with Stephen Frears, Hanif Kureishi, Sarah Radclyffe and Tim Bevan (1986, 98 mins, audio only)
- Gordon Warnecke on My Beautiful Laundrette (2015, 25 mins)
- Original theatrical trailer
- Typically British: A Personal History of British Cinema by Stephen Frears (Michael Dibb & Stephen Frears, 1994, 77 mins): the director's affectionate exploration of British cinema and the films that influenced him
- I'm British But… (Gurinder Chadha, 1989, 30 mins): fascinating documentary on what it meant to be a young British Asian in the 1980s from the director of Bend It Like Beckham
- Memsahib Rita (Prathiba Parma, 1994, 19 mins): a short film starring Nisha Nayar and Meera Syal exploring the physical and emotional violence of racism
- Illustrated booklet with full film credits and essays by Sarfraz Manzoor, Sukhdev Sandhu, Simran Hans, Michael Brooke and Alex Davidson
- Optional English SDH subtitles