Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

Blistering performances.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Such an incredible movie.LV (Jane Horrocks) is probably on the autism spectrum, a young woman who practically lives in her room listening to old records. From the front of the building, we can see her father owned a record shop. He is deceased, and his photo hangs on her wall. At night sometimes she puts on one of her records and sings to his photo. Her favorites are his - Judy Garland, Shirley Bassey, and Marilyn Monroe. And it seems she can impersonate all of them.Part of the reason LV (LV stands for Little Voice) stays in her room with the sound cranked up is to blot out her loud mother Mari (Brenda Blethyn), a woman who spends all of her time dressing cheaply and going to the local bar. When the telephone is put in at their house, LV meets Billy, the main telephone man's assistant. Billy is shy and devoted to his homing pigeons, and he takes a shine to LV, even coming back to visit her later.One night Mari picks up Ray Say, an agent for burlesque acts. He hears LV singing and realizes she has a phenomenal voice - something apparently her self-absorbed mother never noticed. Ray thinks he can make her a star. Her first attempt doesn't work out due to her shyness but he talks her into trying again. He bets everything on her, selling his meager possessions and setting her up in a show at his friend Boo's (Jim Broadbent) club. LV knocks 'em dead after seeing her father's ghost in the audience. But then Ray wants her to perform again the next night, and he invites a big agent. This starts off as a somewhat light film, in spite of the fact that LV's mother is such a horrible human being. However, the film turns into something else, terrifying and uplifting at the same time.I can't say enough about the performances. Jane Horrocks is best known for being the secretary on AbFab - she is such a wonderful actress, singer, and impersonator, she'll knock your socks off. Michael Caine reminded me a bit of Olivier in "The Entertainer" - third rate, seedy, but with plenty of anger and emotion inside. Brenda Blethyn - well, she's fantastic - a beautiful woman who can look and act like a total slut, be a sweet, lovely woman, or the tough detective Vera. Here, with her short skirts, booze, and cigarettes, she creates an unforgettable character.Ewan McGregor is adorable, so much like LV - a loner with an obsessive hobby, badly treated by his boss just as LV is by her mother. You root for them the whole time and long for both of them to be free, like Billy's birds.A very, very powerful ending - don't miss this.

When LV, "laura", (Jane Horrocks) gets on the stage and really does her stuff, we see talent that she seems to have hidden in all her other roles. Such a pity? Playing the funny but very silly Bubble in Ab- Fab is a distraction? (Mo, in "Born Romantic" is much better?)Here it is hard to believe this is the same Jane! And then she retreats into the strange fantasy world. With such a flimsy story, the movie has to include various trivial scenes just to fill out the time, ie, Billy (Ewan McGregor) and his pigeons, and then there was the blousy, brassy mother, Mari who is awful - gosh it must take really good skills to act that stuff? They get a telephone installed. Great, that fills up a few minutes and provides a few feeble laughs. "You must be the famous Phone Bill". yerss. The house has appalling electrical wiring, cue sparks, blackouts, and later a fire. The dead father gets a few minutes too.Michael Caine's role is sleazy show promoter. Nothing special there. Same for all the others?

This film could be entitled the meek and the mild v the vulgar and wild.In one camp, you've got Little Voice (Jane Horrocks) and her 'friend', Billy, (Ewan McGregor), a thoroughly sweet pigeon breeder. Two shy characters who wouldn't say boo! to a goose. In the other camp - how do I put it? Well, if paint stripper could talk and sulphuric acid could walk, they would be Ray Say (Michael Caine) and Mari Hoff (Brenda Blethyn). Two contrasting camps and some very powerful performances.Brenda Blethyn is monstrously good in this. So much so, it's painful to watch. She is so nasty, my heart sank as I realised this over the top and brilliant performance was not going to spare me. The first scene was shocking as I took in the appearance and demeanour of her character. She is the true embodiment of vulgarity: Fag Ash Lil meets Motor Mouth.As her character develops, you realise there are no spiteful depths that she will not plummet to belittle and berate her daughter who is far more talented, beautiful and gentle than she could ever hope to be. Little Voice's talent awakens the envious beast that's inside her mother. It's no wonder LV doesn't speak a word.Enter Ray Say, the small-time music manager who's chunky jewellery, flash car and underworld contacts can't hide the fact that he's one of life's losers. He never quite hit the big time. He's Delboy but without a sense of humour. And that's tragic. Like Mari, he tries to cover up his desperation but it seeps through the cracks like mud through broken concrete.When Ray realises the range of talent that Little Voice casually displays, he can't contain his excitement. He soon realises that he'll have to put up with her mother if he's going to groom the star that's living under the same roof as her. But Mari doesn't take kindly to being second best to her daughter and the open display of vitriol that she unleashes on LV is nothing short of the vilest verbal abuse.So that's it in a northern nutshell. Will Ray pluck LV out of obscurity? How will he do it? How much longer will he put up with Mari, the acid-tongued witch? A tongue with a life all of its own - when it's not lunging for Ray's throat, it's creating mayhem - two beasts, one woman. That in itself is a dilemma.Caine's performance is nothing short of stunning. He makes sleazy look so easy. What can't he do? He is 'Red Hot Ray' with his tacky clothes and car. His expletive-ridden karaoke at the end of the film is raw and powerful and the most memorable part of the film: a goggle-eyed, seething, drunk desperado, the like I've never seen on film.Jane Horrocks is wonderful. She is clearly a fantastic mimic and is able to capture perfectly the voices of Shirley Bassey, Marilyn Monroe and Judy Garland. Jim Broadbent is also fantastic (no surprises there) as the nightclub host. Ewan McGregor is the sweet shy love interest and plays it well. With a line up like this, it's hard for Little Voice to be anything other than brilliant. But, there's no question about it, no amount of perfect mimicry can outshine Blethyn and Caine in this film. It belongs to them. The casting director deserves a place in heaven for this pairing.

I didn't really want to see this film in the first place - that's why it's taken 8 years . You need to be in the right frame of mind to appreciate many films, otherwise they just don't "click". But it was quid pro quo for the crappy sci-fi and horror and offbeat "arty-type" films I like to watch occasionally. From all I'd heard about the singing, I thought this film was going to be a musical. So when I realised this wasn't a musical, had Jane Horrocks, Michael Cane and Jim Broadbent in it, I thought it couldn't be all bad. The film seems to have been accepted as a real peach. Sadly it's not, but instead more of a curates egg - good in parts. The singing is good - but not exceptional enough to carry the film on it's own. Michael Cane puts in a very classy performance, and Jane Horrocks certainly does a job with the lines she was given. Jim Broadbent has a marginal, but significant role. Ewan McGregor, does OK with his 5 minutes but his character's involvement after the first 10 minutes seems to be a bit of an afterthought. Annette Badland, is a really excellent actress with a wide range(Archers and Dr Who fans will know this), and was wasted on this part, though she plays it well. Brenda Blethyn must have been told "play an actress who is hamming up a performance as a busty irritating Hilda Ogden on speed". If so, she did a very good job. Somehow it just felt as if they had rehearsed their roles separately, and the director has then taken the first cut on every shoot to get it over with as quickly as possible. Even though I wasn't expecting much from this, it feels like this film could have been so much better than it turned out to be. All in all not a bad film, but somehow it's much less good than the sum of the performances - frustratingly disappointing.