SummaryAn ambitious Pakistani Briton and his white boyfriend strive for success and hope when they open a glamorous laundromat.
Directed By:Stephen Frears
Written By:Hanif Kureishi
My Beautiful Laundrette
Metascore
Generally Favorable
76
User score
Generally Favorable
6.8
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Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
76
90% Positive
19 Reviews
19 Reviews
10% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
100
It is a sharp, smart picture, with English eccentricity, sly quirk and political subversion, that represents a brilliant and almost unique engagement with contemporary history in 80s British cinema.
88
Frears uses the story of one relationship, intimate but exploitive, to mirror England's racial strife. By turns tender and angry, it's a film of distinctive, commanding voice. [28 Mar 1986, p.D2]
User score
Generally Favorable
6.8
71% Positive
12 Ratings
12 Ratings
18% Mixed
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
12% Negative
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
Nov 22, 2022
8
The young Pakistani Omar convinces his uncle Nasser to entrust him with a laundromat that he would like to run together with Johnny, with whom he is in love. This is just the beginning of a long series of vicissitudes. A great film with great direction and above all with a great Daniel Day Lewis.
Nov 25, 2021
7
This is a good film of its time, depicting a bleak picture for Indian immigrants in London, trying to fit in, in the big city. Its obviously set in the 1980s, when it was very much Thatchers Britain. The dialogue is quite frank at times, with racial slurs made by a local group of layabouts. It was certainly interesting to see Daniel Day-Lewis in one of his earlier roles - I'm not sure I would have recognised him, if I hadn't read up about the cast beforehand. There's some good dialogue present in the script, one line that particularly comes to mind being when the launderettes manager, the father, responds to someone saying 'I am a businessman, not a professional Pakistani!'. This is no big Hollywood type film at all - neither should it be but as a piece of social commentary its pretty effective. Yes I'd recommend it.
80
It’s the committed turn from Day-Lewis and Hanif Kureishi’s socially-astute, Oscar-nominated screenplay that manages to compensate for the film’s technical shortcomings, alongside the (then) landmark casual representation of a gay relationship on screen.
80
My Beautiful Laundrette has the broad scope and the easy pace that one associates with our best theatrical films. It puts its own truth above the fear of possibly offending someone. Without showing off, it has courage as well as artistry. A fascinating, eccentric, very personal movie.
75
Movie could use a little of the tight plotting and clarity that made The Hit so effective. But perhaps the new film's diffuse nature is the price of its ambitiousness. Besides, in many ways My Beautiful Laundrette is a beauty.
75
A movie like this lives or dies with its performances, and the actors in My Beautiful Laundrette are a fascinating group of unknowns.
50
My Beautiful Laundrette is quirky and fresh and ambitious and pretty much everything a movie should be, except good.
Sep 1, 2025
6
Movie is a bit overrated , It's slightly amusing, A nice, off beat slice of life, No real plot, No progressive preaching, Just accepts characters as is, And doesn't shy away from issues like Pakistani immigrants need for money, to find acceptance in English society,
