MovieChat Forums > I, Daniel Blake (2017) Discussion > Perspective from a civil servant

Perspective from a civil servant

posted 8 years ago by tkksilvergun
10 replies | jump to latest

I have experience working within the system in several benefits and I 100% agree with the polemic behind this film - many of the rules and regulations are overly harsh and the bureaucratical side of passing cases back and forth leads to an objectivity that results in extremely harsh decisions for many claimants - and the film got the lingo and balance (in my experience) of decent staff to jobsworths about right.

HOWEVER - Paul Laverty's script is terrible anytime it tries to engage in actual human drama as opposed to staging scenes of righteous indignation (even these end up hackneyed by the time the Martine McCutcheon-alike lead arrives on the scene). The lead actress was actually really good but given material beyond cliche that just piled on the misery mercilessly, and the equally impressive lead couldn't even save the awful speeches his character was forced to deliver. And don't get me started on the token Scots that turn up here and there. The ending had people in my cinema wanting to shout at the screen and some laughing.

I still like it overall but the first half is much stronger than the second and a little subtlety wouldn't have gone amiss. Loach should ditch Laverty if he really is going to continue making films into his eighties because his directing style isn't strong enough to make up for this kind of soapy/greeting-card sentimental material.

IMO of course!

[–] Caz_MDB 8 years ago

Great to have your perspective from working within the system as I thought it was pretty spot on with the decent staff and the ones being jobsworths. As watching it Daniel Blake is actually a good guy who is trying and been well hung out to dry by the stupid rules, when they won't actually listen about his doctor, although I am sure this could be sorted out in a quicker and better manner.

I do know though that we certainly have in the North East a lot of people who do everything they cannot to work and be on benefits, I am so pleased the film managed to find the balance with that. Although we never actually got a character like that as I think it would have effected the tone and point they were making about Blake.

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[–] tkksilvergun 8 years ago

It's such a shame cos something/someone needs to engage with the system as it is right now and this film could have been the one to do it but it's so heavy-handed, the only folk who are gonna pay attention to it are already informed . . .

[–] rick-220 8 years ago

It's such a shame cos something/someone needs to engage with the system as it is right now and this film could have been the one to do it but it's so heavy-handed, the only folk who are gonna pay attention to it are already informed . . .

This, exactly this. I appreciate Loach trying to make a valid point, but he overstretches and oversimplifies and therefore overshoots the mark.

“When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser.” Aristotle

[–] mackay254 8 years ago

I know what you mean, in a way. It does kind of pile it on, but that's what sometimes happens in life. Misery is heaped on misery. As for 'token Scots' popping up, there's quite a few a few of them knocking around this neck of the woods.

[–] tkksilvergun 8 years ago

Are they all foul-mouthed alcoholics? Felt a little cliched, like something out of an Irvine Welsh story. It wasn't so much the misery, it was the timing / how it was integrated - felt very forced. The ending - the appeal scene - was borderline laughable. It literally couldn't have been any more obvious. I watch alot of horror films and many good recent examples have dealt with really devastating dramatic scenes in a much more affecting way.

At the end of the day though, the film is striking a chord and making many valid points, I just worry that it's too late to really change much. The DWP is too far down the austerity road to double-back on its methods, the move to online claims is going to lead to alot more inhumane treatment for people with difficult circumstances - expecting people to log 35 hours of job-search activity is a bit unnecessary IMO, it's just an empty box-ticking exercise that's set up to punish the few who don't know what they're doing or who perhaps have more practical experience, to whom spending that amount of time online is just going to be a dispiriting affair.

[–] mackay254 8 years ago

Paragraph 1. I didn't see it the way you saw it.
Paragraph 2. I do.

So, each to their own and isn't it awful? 

[–] Tin Tin-3 8 years ago

There was laughter at the screening I just attended.

This was daytime in Edinburgh, so all the Tories will have been at their mills, exploiting people.

[–] epa101 8 years ago

Token Scots! I didn't notice any. Are you sure that they weren't just Northumbrians? As you go north through Northumberland, the dialect becomes more and more Scottish as you get towards the border.

[–] tkksilvergun 8 years ago

there's two I think, the main one is the really loud drunk one who hangs around during the graffiti / protest / arrest scene as if he's staggered out of an Irvine Welsh novel. Not big or clever and very contrived

[–] epa101 8 years ago

Interesting. I'll have to watch the film again and pay closer attention during this scene.

On a different note, if you don't like Paul Laverty's scripts, you'd probably hate those from Jim Allen, who wrote for most of Loach's films from 1969 to 1995. Some of his scripts give the impression that all working-class people ever do is dream about socialism and all bosses are proved to be evil in the end. Laverty's scripts actually seem relatively balanced in comparison, and some are less political than others (e.g. My Name is Joe and Looking for Eric didn't have very much politics in them).