NASTY NEIGHBOURS

Year: 1999
UK: Redbus Film Distribution
Cast: Ricky Tomlinson, Marion Bailey, Phil Daniels, Rachel Fielding, Hywel Bennett, Debbie Isitt, Nick Whitfield
Director: Debbie Isitt
UK: 88 mins
UK Certificate: 15 for occasional strong language, drug use and violence
UK Release Date: 20 October 2000

Synopsis

When Mr and Mrs Peach's neighbours emigrate to Australia, they leave the grieving Peaches' anxiously wondering who will arrive next door. The new neighbours, Mr and Mrs Chapman, prove to be far from the ideal couple the Peaches had dreamed of. They are loud, rude and aggressive. Mr Peach takes an instant dislike to the "flash" Chapmans aggravated by the fact that, as a desperately bad salesman, he is getting deeper and deeper into debt. Mr Peach is struggling to hold onto his job, his house and his sanity and as the bills mount up and the creditors move in he begins to regress deeper into himself obsessing about the new neighbours and increasingly perceiving them as the enemy.

It is not long before he is spying on their every move, making complaints against them, even damaging their property. The Chapmans, outraged at this "interfering, busybody" behaviour, begin to retaliate, until both sets of neighbours are caught up in an intensifying feud. Their problems escalate out of all proportion and when Mr Chapman dares to stamp on Mr Peach's prize winning pansies a fight breaks out in the garden and Chapman beats up Peach. Mr Peach finally deems his neighbours responsible for all his problems and in one final conflict, decides to make them pay.

Nasty Neighbours is a thrilling black comedy. It puts England under the spotlight and exposes cracks in the veneer of cul-de-sac life. It is the debut feature film of Debbie Isitt.