Sky Peals review – the most moving film about the British highway ever made

The liminal space of the motorway service station doesn’t garner much attention in the media. These buildings exist out of necessity rather than desire, allowing motorists a chance to use the loo or grab a quick coffee. In the school holidays they are populated by harried-looking parents with carsick kids and coach-loads of hungover teenagers returning from festivals, but most of the time, their clientele are lorry drivers and other weary travellers just passing through – an automotive limbo.

Shy, awkward Adam Muhammed (Faraz Ayub) works the night shift in a burger shop at the fictitious Sky Peals Services and likes the quiet. He deliberately takes the kitchen jobs so he can interact with as few people as possible, and is studiously ignoring the fact that his mum Donna (Claire Rushbrook) has sold their family home so she can move in with her new partner.

One night, Adam receives a voicemail from his estranged father Hassan (Jeff Mirza) requesting that they meet up after years of silence. He says he has something to tell him. A few days later, Adam gets another call, this time from his uncle Hamid (Simon Nagra), who tells him his father has died.

Stricken by guilt for not answering the phone when his father called, Adam must contend with the cajoling of his mother to move out and the arrival of Jeff (Steve Oram), his aggressively chipper new manager at work who attempts to make Adam take a more people-oriented role. His only ally is another new employee, single mum Tara (Natalie Gavin), who warms to Adam despite his tendency to close himself off from the world.

Writer/​director Moin Hussain’s feature debut is a quintessentially British film, flitting between the strange service station to the hushed, melancholy neighbourhoods of suburban Britain, replete with overcast skies and one memorable orange Volvo estate car. But beyond the sense of place that Sky Peals creates, both in its domestic settings and the eerie calm of Sky Peals services, Hussain captures the agony of being caught between two worlds, and not feeling a part of either. Adam is distant from his mother despite their love for one another, and when he reconnects with his uncle and cousins, he struggles to identify with them, despite being welcomed with open arms.

Wrapped into this is a nuanced neurodivergent-coded character; Adam is seen self-soothing at several points, has difficulty connecting with other people and feels completely isolated. The film shows the difficulty of living with an undiagnosed neurodivergent condition, and how this can make one feel like an alien who has crash-landed on a strange planet. Yet despite Adam’s difficulties, it’s important to see that he is surrounded by good people who are patient with him (with the notable exception of his customers).

A scene in which Adam unpacks some of his late father’s belongings is particularly moving, as he attempts to recreate a version of the man he didn’t really know but feels a connection to all the same. Hussain’s film deftly explores the emotional toll of existing as a modern man who feels out of step with the world around him.

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