prick up your ears (1987)

"The plebs at their simple pleasures."
A journalist looks into the life of playwrite Joe Orton (Gary Oldham), his rise to fame and subsequent violent death at the hands of his boyfriend Kenneth Halliwell (Alfred Molina). Both move to London to achieve fame as actors, but move into writing, but whilst Orton becomes fated and famous, Halliwell is stuck in the flat brooding and paranoid, as Orton's success takes him further and further from Halliwell.
A wonderful biopic focused on the complexities of relationships. Who knows why these two quite different characters hooked up together, but their dynamic helped Orton to write some fascinating plays, before Helliwell brought it all crashing down. And for all its tragedy, there is true comedy in there as well, as the pair observe and comment on the everyday activities and people around them.