Omar (Gordon Warnecke), son of a Pakistani immigrant, embarks on a venture to renovate his uncle's laundrette with the help of his childhood friend, ex-National Front member Johnny (Day-Lewis), with whom he develops a gay relationship.

This controversial culture-clash comedy captured the tensions of multiculturalism and Thatcherism whilst its central gay inter racial relationship was both praised and criticised.

Today, the issues it grapples with still feel relevant, and its deliberately awkward politics of new money, entrepreneurial possibility and neoliberalism, coupled with the presence of disenfranchised white working class, and the foregrounding of a gay relationship make the film resonate loudly 40 years on.