Ken Loach

Ken Loach - latest news.

Latest - July 2008. In one of the strangest pieces of film news of recent years, it has been revealed that Ken Loach's next film will heavily feature Eric Cantona, and before you ask, no it's not going to be a martial arts film. Loach is typically secretive about the project but it has emerged that, in May 2008 Loach started filming the project in Manchester with the working title 'Looking For Eric'. Intriguingly it seems like Cantona approached Loach with the idea for the story, and it looks like he will also be a co-producer of the film. Regular Loach collaborator Paul Laverty has provided the screenplay. Slated for release in 2009, it's a film we can't wait to see.

Ken Loach - A biography part 1: 1930s to 1960s . (Ken Loach part 2, part 3, part 4).

Ken Loach was was born Kenneth Loach on 17th June 1936 in Nuneaton, Warwickshire. Following his national service in the RAF, he moved onto Oxford to read law and it was here he performed with the Oxford Revue comedy group. This led him into acting and by the time he'd completed his studies in Law he had become involved with the repertory theatre as both an actor and director. This in turn led Loach to join first, the ABC Television company in 1961 as an Assistant Director, and then the BBC in 1963 as a Trainee Director.

Ken Loach's early career at the BBC saw him directing episodes of Z-Cars, and more significantly Diary of a Young Man which followed the adventures of two young working class lads who come down from the North to seek their fame and fortune in London. The series was significant in that unlike other serials of the time, Loach was able to film some of the segments on location.

1965 saw Ken Loach being used as one of the "in house" directors of the groundbreaking The Wednesday Play series at The BBC. During 1965 he directed no fewer than six of these plays A Tap on the Shoulder, Wear a Very Big Hat, Three Clear Sundays, Up the Junction, The End of Arthur's Marriage and The Coming Out Party. Of these plays, Up The Junction made perhaps the most impact, but also courted a certain amount of controversy at the same time. Up The Junction tells the story of three young women factory workers in their work lives and home lives. The focus is on one of the women in particular - Rube. We follow Rube as she meets her first boyfriend, gets pregnant, has a illegal and botched back street abortion and lose her boyfriend in a motorbike crash. The abortion story line was controversial at the time, as was the inter cutting of real life interviews mixed in with the drama. This was a signpost for Ken Loach's future favoured directing style striving for naturalism and realism. NB. A feature film of Up The Junction was made in 1968 (but without Ken Loach's involvement). Up the Junction would also be significant in that he would for the first time work with Tony Garnett who would produce on many future Ken Loach projects.

1966 saw Ken Loach's breakthrough piece, also part of The Wednesday Play series. This was Cathy Come Home. The play follows the lives of young sweethearts Cathy (Carol White fresh from Up The Junction) and Reg (Ray Brooks). We see Cathy and Reg starting out as a newly married couple, moving into a new place and having children. Reg then suffers an accident meaning he is unable to work and they end up being evicted and separating. With Cathy homeless but still looking after the children, she faces having her children being taken away from her by Social Services. This is perhaps the play that has had more impact than any other on television, highlighting the very real problem of Homelessness. A ground swell of opinion following the play's transmission forced Councils into revising their housing policies, and also the formation of the first national homeless charity - Shelter. Even some forty years later (viewing the BFI released DVD), the power of both the story and the images captured in Cathy Come Home is undiminished, attributable mainly to the realism approach employed in the play.

A further Wednesday Play was completed by Loach in 1967. In Two Minds charts the turbulent life of a young women who endures a difficult family life and, after throwing a kitchen knife at her mother, is diagnosed as a schizophrenic. Much like Cathy Come Home, the realistic documentary style approach helps provide an added emphasis to the story and the message of the play.

1967 also saw Ken Loach's first feature film Poor Cow. The film is set in London and centres around Joy (Carol White again), a young working class mother who is married to a brutal criminal -Tom. When Tom is put in prison for a violent robbery Joy is left to cope with bringing up her child alone and in squalid circumstances. In due course she falls for Tom's friend Dave, another criminal. Dave is kind hearted and the two are happy making plans and trying to get their lives sorted out. But this is thrown into chaos when Dave himself is put into prison. Joy is alone again and does her best to try and get things in order for her young child's sake, but as she finds it so difficult to look after just herself (especially with no man around) how will she cope? Poor Cow (from the pen of Nell Dunn author of Up The Junction) carries the hallmarks of Loach's realist approach and social comment. But given the "freedom" of a feature film the realism is not as intense, with some visual decoration ensuring the viewer that this isn't a documentary after all. Critically well received Poor Cow even garnered a Golden Globe nomination.

1968 saw the next Ken Loach play from the Wednesday Play series. The Golden Vision was a story following a family of devoted Everton fans, somewhat of a lighter subject than many of Loach's other contributions. The following year saw Loach's last contribution to the series with the Jim Allen penned The Big Flame a story of striking Liverpool dock workers, who decide that to safeguard their futures they must control the port themselves. This was the first of many Ken Loach / Jim Allen collaborations - many of which would be starkly political in sympathy with their political beliefs.

1969 would also see Ken Loach's next foray into feature film with the Barry Hines penned Kes. The story centres around Billy Casper who lives in an industrial town in the North of England at the end of the 1960's. Like all industrial towns it has seen better days, and life for everyone is hard. Casper is on the cusp of leaving school and will end up working in a factory or manual job. The school is tough (as are both the teachers and the kids) and is seen to need to be that way in order to prepare the kids for the harsh realities of life that await them in the "real world" of work. Billy's life seems mapped out for both him and all around him - hard manual work if he wants to survive. The only escape he has from the harsh drudgery of his life is with the training of a kestrel (Kes) that he has reared and trained. But how long can he hold on to this thing of beauty. Kes was a more straightforward film than his previous feature film Poor Cow and such was the strength of the story, it was an immediate commerical and critical success (picking up numerous Bafta nominations / awards along the way). Kes has remained one of the best loved and most highly regarded British films of all time.

The story continues on Ken Loach Biography Part 2