Follows headteacher Steve battling for his reform college’s survival while managing his mental health. Concurrently, troubled student Shy navigates his violent tendencies and fragility, torn between his past and future prospects.
Pam Says:
“Steve” delivers one of the most emotionally resonant and authentically crafted examinations of mental health and alternative education that we’ve seen in recent cinema. Director Tim Mielants, reuniting with Cillian Murphy after their overlooked masterpiece “Small Things Like These,” creates a documentary-style narrative that feels both intimate and expansive in its exploration of trauma, healing, and the weight of responsibility carried by those who dedicate their lives to helping others.
The film centers on Steve (Cillian Murphy), the compassionate leader of an expensive government-funded alternative educational facility designed for troubled teenagers who have fallen through the cracks of traditional schooling. What makes this story particularly compelling is how Mielants frames the narrative through the lens of a documentary film crew observing the facility, creating layers of observation that mirror our own voyeuristic relationship with these vulnerable young lives. This meta-textual approach never feels gimmicky; instead, it adds authenticity to the proceedings while highlighting the ethical complexities of exposing trauma for the sake of understanding.
Murphy’s performance as Steve is nothing short of extraordinary, showcasing his remarkable ability to convey profound emotional depth through subtle gestures and measured restraint. We witness Steve as the perpetual calming presence, the anchor of stability in a sea of chaos and pain, yet Murphy brilliantly reveals the cracks in this facade. The burden Steve carries becomes palpable as we watch him navigate crisis after crisis, always maintaining his professional composure while his personal well-being slowly erodes. The film’s most powerful moments come when we see Steve alone, stripped of his leadership role, confronting his own need for support and the difficulty of asking for help when you’re accustomed to being the helper.
The ensemble of young actors delivers performances that feel lived-in and authentic, avoiding the pitfalls of melodrama that often plague films dealing with troubled youth. Jay Lycurgo’s portrayal of Shy is particularly heartbreaking, capturing the vulnerability and defensive mechanisms of a teenager who longs for unconditional love and for the innocense of his past. Lycurgo brings such nuanced emotional intelligence to the role that we find ourselves genuinely invested in Shy’s journey, feeling protective and hopeful in equal measure. His scenes with Murphy crackle with the tension between hope and skepticism, creating some of the film’s most emotionally charged moments.
Luke Ayres as Jamie provides a different kind of complexity, embodying the student who seems determined to sabotage every opportunity for connection or growth. Rather than presenting Jamie as simply antagonistic, Ayres reveals the pain and fear underlying his disruptive behavior, making us understand that his troublemaking is both a cry for help and a test of the adults’ commitment to not giving up on him. Joshua Barry’s explosive performance as Ash adds another layer to the facility’s ecosystem, demonstrating how trauma manifests differently in each individual while requiring equally individualized approaches to healing.
The supporting performances from seasoned actors Tracey Ullman and Emily Watson provide crucial grounding for the film’s exploration of institutional care and psychological intervention. Ullman, in a beautifully subdued turn as Amanda, brings intellectual rigor and genuine compassion to her role, while Watson’s psychologist character serves as the film’s moral compass, seeing through facades and challenging both students and staff to confront uncomfortable truths about themselves and their relationships.
What elevates “Steve” beyond typical social issue filmmaking is Mielants’ commitment to showing rather than telling, allowing the complexity of mental health treatment and alternative education to unfold naturally without resorting to easy answers or false hope. The film acknowledges the limitations of even the most well-intentioned programs while celebrating the small victories and genuine connections that make the work worthwhile. The pacing is deliberately measured, reflecting the reality that healing and growth happen slowly, often imperceptibly, requiring patience from both caregivers and audiences.
The documentary-within-the-film structure serves multiple purposes, cringing as we witness the news-making team who push the boundaries. We become complicit in the act of watching these vulnerable individuals, forced to confront our own motivations for consuming stories of trauma and recovery. This self-reflexive element adds intellectual depth without sacrificing emotional impact.
“Steve” succeeds brilliantly in humanizing mental illness and the challenges faced by alternative educational facilities, avoiding both sensationalism and sanitization. It’s a film that trusts its audience to sit with discomfort and uncertainty, to appreciate the complexity of human psychology and the heroic yet imperfect efforts of those working on the front lines of mental health care. Mielants has crafted a deeply empathetic and intellectually rigorous examination of care, responsibility, and the courage required to ask for help when you’re used to being the one providing it.
Chuck says:
Utilizing a fly-on-the-wall approach and capitalizing on a dynamic performance from Cillian Murphy, Tim Mielents’ “Steve” is an immersive experience that, at times, you wish you could keep at arm’s length. Intense from the word “go,” it charts one 24-hour period in the life of a well-meaning but overwhelmed English school teacher, a single day that sees him put through the wringer on a variety of fronts. While the intent is sound, Max Porter’s script is overwhelmed with incident. A sense that far too much is being piled on the titular character sets in after he puts out the fourth or fifth fire of his day and the strain begins to set on him as well as the viewer. It all becomes a bit much, though Murphy’s performance elicits and sustains our sympathy throughout.
Taking place in 1996, the Stanton Wood Manor is a reform school for young men who’ve exhausted every opportunity in England’s education system. This is their last stop before being cast out on their own and each tax each staff members’ patience. The institution in question is a pressure-cooker, an understaffed, underfunded operation coming apart at the seams. Fights are a daily occurrence as is blatant disrespect towards teachers; academics are an afterthought. Yet Steve, Shola (Little Simz), Amanda (Tracey Ullman) and Jenny (Emily Watson) persevere, often to their own detriment.
Over the course of this seemingly endless day, the staff is told the institution is shutting down, host a disastrous visit from a member of Parliament, deals with a suicide attempt and must contend with a documentary film crew that’s come to do a news story. Mielents’ camera hovers over Steve’s shoulder throughout, following him relentlessly as he attempts to juggle these various crises. It’s an effective approach, its vicarious nature allowing the viewer to feel the protagonist’s mounting stress, the camera becoming more jittery as Steve falls apart.
The director employs this method during the film’s first two acts only to abandon it when things reach a fever pitch. Suddenly, the camera is flying through the air, doing summersaults and careening about the grounds, when Shy (Jay Lycurgo), one of the most troubles students, goes missing. It’s a jarring change that shatters the documentary-like approach Mielents effectively created, a curious move that nearly derails the entire production.
Thankfully, our emotional investment in the characters is enough to keep us engaged. Murphy is not an overtly expressive actor, rather he’s a master at internalizing his characters’ feelings and thoughts, expressing them with subtle power. He employs this approach early on, only to become uncharacteristically expressive as Steve’s world crumbles. It’s a bracing, effective change. His veteran co-stars, Ullman and Watson, are underused but, as we’ve come to expect, each makes an impression with the limited time they have.
Porter manages to walk a fine line in wrapping up the story. After being immersed in such a volatile environment, it would seem disingenuous to suggest there’s any hope at all for Shy and his brethren. Yet, a chance at redemption is hinted at that avoids being cloying or manipulative. The path to some sort of pseudo-happiness for these kids is unlikely, but not impossible. Much of this hinges on teachers such as Steve, educators whose greatest weapon is their empathy and selflessness. They still exist, but their numbers are dwindling, and “Steve” serves as yet another reminder that we take them for granted and we will all ultimately pay the price for doing so.
3 Stars
