Saturday, July 06, 2013
Working Backward
To say that Mike Leigh writes and directs a film is a bit upside down.
His approach is collaborative.
Get the actors together and "workshop" it. The idea or the core of a subject.
This is not a particularly new idea today or even in 1990 but Leigh has mastered it and, as a result, has produced his films slowly and against the stream.
His first real success, the film that validates his approach is/was
starring his "co-writers" Jim Broadbent, Alison Steadman, Claire Skinner, Jane Horrocks, Claire Skinner, Timothy Spall, Stephen Rea and David Thewlis.
It is about a family. It goes from happy and funny to deeper and sad. It shows a lower middle class British family getting by. This class thing is particularly British in that every one of them has to battle against who they are "told" they are to be who they really are. So it is about identity.
It is about how, despite our best intentions, kids and parents turn out differently than we expect. Friends fail us. Sometimes they rally in our defense.
There is a lot going on here.
There are twins. They are dead opposites. The truth is finally told. The conclusions are left up in the air.
It is very human.
The whole thing sneaks up on us and eventually, for me, grabs us by the ass and will not let go.
Watch the mum working in day-care and see her with other people's kids. See the reality of her own poor sad twin who is clueless about life. The other who thrives. The husband who is a dreamer. And so on.
In short, get to know them and know their truths. After all, they say, the truth will out.
It does here.
There is a restaurant, just opening, called Regret Rien. Regret Nothing. There is a lot of that in every person in the film.
It is funny that there is a LOT in here about food.
This DVD is a Criterion restoration. Fun to watch. Hard to digest at times.
Once is enough for me. I feel to much like an observer outside the tank watching fish swim around. But I get it.
A 3 out of Netflix5. I love Jim Broadbent. Here are Jane Horrocks and David Thewlis. A confrontation. Some truth.
Labels: films
