THE FILMS OF KEN LOACH

“Gritty, urban and realistic” would probably be your reply if I asked what you thought about Ken Loach Movies. His direction is held, within certain narrative, down to perfect detail in every shot and pan. His ability to draw you into these rather complex lives and make you feel happy, sad, tragic and suicidal is a gift only he possesses. A true British Genius. After recently witnessing ‘Kes’ and ‘Raining Stones’ I noticed how brilliant Loach is and how clever each scene is in any of his works. I remember I watched ‘Kes’ at school as part of my English G.C.S.E. I really enjoyed the movie and saw it as something totally different, something new. I had never seen anything so pure and simple in story telling, so suttle in content but yet so harsh and disturbingly unfair in film before. This had no happy ending, no hollywood dreams of society. This was the society I was use to. The British Society. I could associate more with the British outlook than the American version. Loach made me witness this harsh, brutal wilderness for myself, he pulled my young mind in and made me watch everything that happened.

‘Raining Stones’ is completely different in content but still holds the moral and heart warming social satire that ‘Kes’ holds. His directing seems somewhat complex but Loach, however, is hesitant to discuss the style and technique of his directing. However he comments that with each film "you try and build on the ashes of the one before and try to do it better, and come to it with a blank sheet of paper so the material can dictate it’s own form structure and method".

Loach embraces neither notions of being a realist or naturalist film director, as he does not wish for his films to be dictated by a particular label. Critics - class a Loach film at your doom. Loach's films, especially ‘Cathy Come Home’, ‘Raining Stones’ and ‘Ladybird Ladybird’ do not provide resolutions at their climax, making it a "watch and see" resolution. It is a reality formula. In attempting to show social truths in this way, Loach continues distinct trends not just in British film but theatre aswell.

In casting for ‘My Name Is Joe’, Loach chose only actors from Glasgow. He states that "People don't always recognise this when a film goes to another country, but everyone is from a few streets or certainly a few districts away. We, by and large, discounted people from other Scottish cities. It may not be apparent to people from the States, but it's certainly apparent to the people in Scotland and it's apparent to the actors. People tend to have a shorthand when they're with people they know".

Many fine actors have blossomed working with Loach and gone onto very successful careers. These include Robert Carlyle, Frances McDormand, Ricky Tomlinson, Bruce Jones, Terence Stamp, Carol White, Colin Welland and Lynne Perrie. ‘Land And Freedom’ which bombed in America due to its strong themes which many Americans would not understand, is Loach’s strongest all of his subsequent films. Loach again returns to the themes of hopelessness which I  highlighted as witnessing from my classroom with ‘Kes’. Harsh, brutal, hilarious, tragic all in the same movie. Ken Loach can do everything in his own unique style. Only Mike Leigh can come close to matching the brilliance of this great director.

Filmography 1964 Diary of a Young Man 1967 Poor Cow 1969 Kes 1971 Family Life 1980 The Gamekeeper 1981 Looks and Smiles 1986 Fatherland 1990 Hidden Agenda 1991 Riff-Raff 1993 Raining Stones 1994 Ladybird Ladybird 1995 Land and Freedom 1996 Carla's Song 1997 The Flickering Flame 1998 My Name is Joe 2000 Bread and Roses

BACK TO FRONT