I, Daniel Blake
SPEC D: Ken Loach. UK/France/Belgium. 105 min. Sep 12, 8:30 pm, Scotiabank 1 Sep 16, 6 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1. Rating: NNN
Winner of the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, the latest from Loach and regular screenwriter Paul Laverty is another of their signature social dramas, this time exploring Britain’s increasingly privatized (and increasingly apathetic) welfare system.
Erroneously deemed fit for work after a heart attack, widowed labourer Blake (Dave Johns) wants only to correct that mistake and continue his recovery, but he’s thwarted at nearly every turn by clerks and middle managers determined to stick to a script. He befriends a young single mother (Hayley Squires) who’s struggling to find work, and the two form an unlikely mutual support system.
Like most of Loach and Laverty’s recent output, this is a solidly crafted drama with a couple of piercing moments. But it’s also a movie designed to make a point rather than tell a story, which means it sees its characters less as human beings than as symbols marching toward a predetermined ending. I wish I could believe the filmmakers were aware of that irony.
