Friday, June 3, 2016

I, Daniel Blake (2016)

I, Daniel Blake won the Palme d'Or. And don't get me wrong, it's a solid movie. But by no means was it the best. Ken Loach is a bleeding heart liberal and it shows with a fiery passion for two hours straight. His contempt for British bureaucracy is meant to get the viewer riled up. We feel intense anger and immense sadness for the tragic situation that the honest heroes find themselves in, no fault of their own. There is no subtlety. Loach is very straightforward, unabashedly wearing his politics. And the film just keeps hitting you, tearing you further down until you just want to give up. But Daniel Blake doesn't give up. He's a working class hero (and Ken Loach a hero to the working class) and through all the red tape he perseveres. He's extremely compassionate and likable and relatable. There are some cringe-y scene transitions, with a cheesy fade to black to show the passage of time. You see what Ken Loach really thinks about computers, as Daniel Blake gets frustrated trying to figure out how to use it.


Though the film is in English, the thick British accents are almost unintelligible. Funnily enough, the film played with English subtitles. And I found myself reading them to follow along.  It is kind of ironic that it won the Palme d'Or. Maybe the jury felt guilty, acknowledging the plight of regular working people amidst all the glitz and glamor of the exclusive Cannes Film Festival. 

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