The Last of England (Derek Jarman; U.K., 1987)

Derek Jarman’s apocalypse-now vision of Thatcher’s England is an anti–city symphony whose lyricism is put toward a portrait of the damage done. An astounding collage of urban images is edited to flow with dramatic passages—reenactments from hell—and idyllic family footage from before the fall. This nonnarrative film thus has a dramatic progression to it, even a hero: we meet him shooting up in a godforsaken corner; we see his childhood unfold as if in a dream from another lifetime. A beautiful, obsessive, disturbing work, here is Jarman, the craftsman, at his most political—and his most personal.

• Written by Jarman. Photographed by Jarman, Christopher Hughes, Cerith Wyn Evans, Richard Heslop. With Tilda Swinton, Spencer Leigh, Gay Gaynor, Matthew Hawkins. (87 mins, Color, 35mm, From Metropolis Archiv, permission Kino Lorber)