Life is softer for LGBT people in the UK now than it was in the ’80s in “Blue Jean,” when Margaret Thatcher initiated “Section 28.”

Now, as the clouds thin, we find ourselves in a small, dreary school in Newcastle upon Tyne, where our young Jean, a gay physical education teacher, is a basketball coach.

Writer/director Georgia Oakley, a talented director and writer in this, her debut work, gives us Rosy McEwen as Jean, a lovely, athletic young woman, who coaches a ball game in a beige town high school with a whistle hanging around her neck.

From frame one, we see that the town Jean lives in is a cage full of unhappy people of disparate sexual proclivities. In one cage, she’s unhappily forced to adopt a mask, so she seeks refuge at night in a seedy gay bar with rowdy beer drinkers who are her friends.

In school, it appears that most of the faculty seem to see Jean the PE (basketball) coach as a pretty “tomboy,” the stock view of most, but some are suspicious “busybodies” who walk around her like she’s a urine puddle in the hall. It’s reflected in the cafeteria, where she dines alone at the “leper” table.

It’s clear that Jean lives a diaphanous “double” life, “passing” as a straight PE teacher.

At night, she frequents a local gay bar/cafe with her girlfriend Viv, who is covered in tattoos, has cropped hair, biker clothing and a dangerous “in-their-face” attitude.

Viv could be trouble for Jean. All Viv has to do is wait outside the school yard with her lunch every day, but that won’t happen.

Viv is too smart for that, and her love is genuine and respectful.

Their sex is great and their time together fun, but while Jean’s permanent expression of ennui is growing tiresome for Viv, Jean soldiers on.

Then one day fate appears as Lois, (Lucy Halliday) with the soft eyes of a pet dog, a clumsy gait and unruly hair, who is a school discipline problem, enters the class.

Lois is physically tougher than Jean’s daytime “uptown” girls, with zero knowledge of the game. After days of stumbling, Lois gets her game face on and starts sinking baskets and is roundly accepted.

When Jean begins to see her younger self in Lois and starts to favor her with extra guidance, the “Straight Queens” react and stage a shower room incident.

Lois reacts, bringing everything including Jean’s reaction into largest focus.

One night while the 15-year-old Lois sits at the bar in the gay club, another incident breaks out, and Lois flees to the ladies room.

Jean chases her to calm her, holding her against the wall. Some customers misinterpret what they see, and the scene cuts to where they’re brought before the board, and Jean, still fearful of being unveiled, tries to see “both sides.”

It is clear she knows that if she defends Lois full force, it will kick her closet door open. Lois and Jean exchange a painful last glance, and a life-changing betrayal floats between them.

I look forward to seeing more work by McEwen. Kerrie Hayes, who plays Viv, is the best performance in this film. She is very, very good. So is Lydia Page, who etched the sensuous teen Siobhan.

Halliday as “Lois” is a good first-time player with a future. Maybe it is too soon to tell.

Oakley, a first time on the mound, did not knock me out with this one. I had many problems with the script, but given a better backup crew, a better script and money, she surely had good work in her backpack to show us.

I won’t reveal Jean’s final late night act or why she performs it. But finally, we see her sitting in full sunlight, turning an hysterical laugh into a flow of tears. I got it, but don’t accept it. Perhaps you will.

“Blue Jean” opens for your opinion at Waterville’s Maine Film Center. This is mine.

J.P. Devine of Waterville is a former stage and screen actor.

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