In the opening scenes of his directorial debut
Urchin, Harris Dickinson keeps us at a distance from his protagonist Michael (Frank Dillane). We watch from across the street as he trudges up to uninterested pedestrians in search of loose change, gathers with other rough sleepers at a soup kitchen, or seeks a relatively dry and safe space to lay down his cardboard and get some sleep. This distance is apt for a film about homelessness, a problem that many of us choose to ignore as we walk past it every day, but Dickinson gradually brings us closer to Michael, allowing us to see the insecurities and contradictions of someone trapped in a cycle that he cannot break.
