Stuart: A Life Backwards (2007) on Netflix
Writer Alexander Masters meets Stuart Shorter, a homeless man with a record of violence, while campaigning to free two jailed charity workers. Stuart lets him write his story backwards.
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- Netflix3.8/5
- IMDb7.6/1016,678 votes
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Trailer
Plot summary
Stuart Shorter grew up on the edge of Cambridge with facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy, a condition he inherited from his father, and by his thirties he was homeless, drinking heavily and known to the police for violent offenses, with spells in hostels and prison behind him. Alexander Masters, a writer who works for a homeless charity, gets to know him through the campaign to free Ruth Wyner and John Brock, two charity workers jailed after drugs were sold on their premises. The friendship grows, and Alexander asks to write Stuart's life down. Stuart wants it told in reverse, starting with the man he is and ending with the boy he was.
Cast
- Joanna Maudeas Ruth
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Stuart: A Life Backwards (2007)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- In 1999 Stuart Shorter led the campaign to free Ruth Wyner and John Brock, the director and day center manager of Wintercomfort for the Homeless, jailed after drug dealing on the charity's premises. His three-day sleep-out by homeless people outside the Home Office in London won the release of the "Cambridge Two" after six months.
- Stuart Shorter, the book's subject, was one of the first people to bring The Big Issue to Cambridge, and began his activism for the homeless by presenting a BBC2 documentary, Private Investigations, denouncing police plans to ban homeless people from the city center.
SPOILER
Stuart Shorter was hit by the 11.15pm London to King's Lynn train just outside his home village of Waterbeach on 6 July 2002 and was killed instantly, aged 33. The jury at his inquest returned an open verdict.- Recently many secondary schools across the UK have put Stuart: A Life Backwards on their higher education academic syllabus for English language.
