In an interview in Indie London (2006), Shane Meadows referred to This is England as ‘probably the closest thing I'll ever make to a political film’. In this chapter I argue that both This is England (2006) and his late-'90s debut feature TwentyFourSeven (1997) speak to the political Zeitgeist of time and place. TwentyFourSeven does not engage with political themes in an overt way, and, indeed, the youths who occupy the world of the film are entirely disengaged from mainstream politics. However, it does not follow that it is a non-political film. As Martin Fradley observes: ‘although never directly mentioned, the spectre of Thatcherism haunts every frame of Twenty Four Seven (Fradley 2013). In This is England the story centres on the main protagonist's brush with the extremist fringe of British politics. This preoccupation with the margins of British political life has everything to do with the marginality of the social group who are the main focus of Meadows' work: young, working-class men/youths in the forgotten towns of England's former industrial heartlands (Fradley 2010).

I further argue that in both films, political themes are also explored in a more subtle way. Both films are infused with a deep sense of disenchantment with politics. Instead, the protagonists look to charismatic local heroes to infuse their lives with a sense of meaning – something to believe in – and invest a collective sense of pride in their communities at a time when ‘everybody thought the working class was fucked’ (Meadows quoted in Indie London 2006). But ultimately, those heroes disappoint.