#906: LOACH, Ken: I, Daniel Blake (2016)

LOACH, Ken (United Kingdom)
I, Daniel Blake [2016]
Spine #906
Blu-ray

An urgent response to the political realities of contemporary Britain, this bracing drama from celebrated filmmaker Ken Loach takes a hard look at bureaucratic injustice and ineptitude through the eyes of an unassuming working-class hero. After a heart attack leaves him unable to hold a job, the widowed carpenter Daniel Blake (Dave Johns) begins a long, lonely journey through the Kafkaesque labyrinth of the local welfare state. Along the way, he strikes up a friendship with a single mother (Hayley Squires) and her two children, at the mercy of the same system after being evicted from their home. Imbued with gentle humor and quiet rage and conceived for maximum real-world impact, the Palme d'Or-winning I, Daniel Blake is a testament to Loach's tireless commitment to a cinema of social engagement.

100 minutes

Color
5.1 Surround
1:85:1 aspect ratio

Criterion Release 2018

Director/Writers

Screenplay by Paul Laverty.

Ken Loach was 80 when he directed I, Daniel Blake.

Other Loach films in the Collection:

#561: Kes (1970)

The Film

When a screenwriter and a director manage to reach exactly the same feverish peak in a story arc, the result can be devastatingly amazing (the scene in the food bank, for example). Laverty and Loach certainly do so in I, Daniel Blake.

The film resonates with the anger — arrived at oh so naturally — that is contemplated by the unfeeling and soul-deadening encounters with the British social services system experienced by Daniel (Dave Johns) and Katie (Hayley Squires).

Briana Shann (Daisy) and Dylan McKiernan (Dylan) are terrific and naturalistic as Katie’s children; Daniel’s friend, China (Kema Sikazwe), provides additional emotional resonance to the story.

Loach shoots in sequence, avoids ADR and the actors know only what is necessary for that day’s shoot!

Film Rating (0-60):

57

The Extras

The Booklet

Twelve-page wraparound featuring an essay by critic Girish Shambu.

“Art cinena so rarely finds itself at the heart of public debate. When it does, the focus — as with a film as Nagisa Ōshima’s In The Real of the Senses (1976, Spine #466) or Catherine Breillat’s Fat Girl (2001, Spine #259) is usually the censure or banning of a work for sexually transgressive content. But is is uncommon for a movie that describes normal, everyday life, as I, Daniel Blake does, to spark passionate public discourse, and so, when that happened in Great Britain upon that film’s release in 2016, it was a surprise. An early supporter of I, Daniel Blake was the democratic socialist Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the opposition Labour Party and one of the strongest opponents of the government’s austerity programs, which have sought to drastically cut public services and welfare funding. Corbyn took to his Facebook page to announce that Ken Loach’s critique of the British benefits system was ‘one of the most moving films I’ve seen,’ thus helping give the film which had several months earlier won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, a new level of visibility back home. In Parliament, he publicly urged Prime Minister Theresa May of the ruling Conservative Party to watch the movie so she might witness the damage being wrought by the government’s social and economic policies, a harsher version of Thatcherism, on the middle-class and the poor The secretary for work and pensions, Damian Green, retaliated by calling the film ‘monstrously unfair’ — only to admit, when pressed, that he hadn’t actually seen it.”

**

“The feeling of authenticity that I, Daniel Blake exudes, seemingly without effort, is the result of a myriad of thoughtful decisions made about setting, casting, shooting, and (especially) dialect.”

Commentary

From 2016 featuring Loach and screenwriter Laverty.

Fabulous and understated discussion of the politics of the film.

How to Make a Ken Loach Film

A 2016 documentary on the production of I, Daniel Blake.

Versus: The Life and Films of Ken Loach

A 2016 documentary directed by Louise Osmond.

A splendid 94-minute doc, a real detailed look at Loach’s filmography. With the production of this film interwoven into the flow, we get a look at these:

• Controversial television: Up The Junction (1965) [uncredited]
• Cathy Come Home (1966)
• His first feature: Kes (1969) [Spine #561]
• More television: The Rank and File (1971)
• The Big Flame (1969)
• Days of Hope (1975)
• The Price of Coal (1977)
• Black Jack (1979)
• Questions of Leadership (1981) and Which Side Are You On? (1985) — both (more or less) banned by the British television big muckety-mucks …
• Theatre: Perdition (1987); charges of antisemitism…
• Embarrassing commercials (Nestle, McDonalds; heavily regretted);
• Hidden Agenda (1990)
• Riff-Raff (1991)
• Raining Stones (1993)
• Ladybird, Ladybird (1994)
• The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006)
• Land and Freedom (1995)
• The Angel’s Share (2012)
• Sweet Sixteen (2002)
• Looking for Eric (2009)
• My Name is Joe (1998)

Deleted scenes

Of Daniel “pounding the pavement.” Good choice to excise all this; but OTOH, it goes a bit further in showing his unceasing effort at trying to find work.

Very cool moment that should have been included (probably cut for time only) … Daniel meets a young policeman — the son of one of his old friends — and the cop gives him a ride home … China and Piper are walking by and see the police car — they’re obviously uncomfortable. In a very charming scene, Daniel pretends that the cops know all about the “trainers” (USA “sneakers”) thing — until Daniel breaks it up with talk of Chinese water torture. Very cool scene.

Trailer

Extras Rating (0-40):

37

57 + 37 =

94

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