Pas de larmes pour Joy

Not a film of entertainment, but of real lives & limited ambition for the working class in 60's. Enjoyable because of my upbringing, not sure it'd work for most people. Typical Loach. Full of TV actors/actresses of 70's/80's/90's.

You know what to expect when the first scene in Ken Loach's "Poor Cow" is a graphic image of Carol White's character giving birth to her son, although for my taste this was taking documentary realism to extremes. For the remainder of the film we follow White's progress, if that's the right word, for the next few years as she lives a mostly tawdry life on the edge of both poverty and legality, interacting with a mostly dubious set of individuals in not-so-swinging London in the mid-60's.

The narrative is somewhat awkwardly interspersed with chapter plates, presumably written by White, although these don't actually aid the structure of the piece as the film progresses pretty much on a tangential basis although as an insight into her character's naive optimism and childlike simplicity, they may serve some purpose.

Loach's soon to be trademark fly-on-the-wall camera-work is never still, long-shots, extreme close-ups, walking shots, tracking shots all to convince us like his acclaimed TV documentary "Cathy Come Home", of the previous year (with the same actress in the lead) of the veracity of his subject, stripping away all cinematic artifice. In this he succeeds, inviting no pity for her, only portraying her making do and working with what she has, with little prospect of escape.

Of course this unremittingly bleak outlook can be overbearing and cold and there are many scenes where he could and should have called "Cut!" earlier, but as an insight into the working class of supposedly affluent Britain, it's important to hold up a mirror to society as he does here.

In the final scenes, when White is reunited with her temporarily lost child, we are brought full-circle to that shocking opening scene as he reminds us that family love is perhaps the only true love. Whether it will be enough of a basis for White to break out and make a life for herself and her son is debatable so that some sort of a sequel might have been interesting to consider.

The cast is an interesting one with Terence Stamp demonstrating his range as the crook who White falls for and who shows her a kind of loving, even as the film makes clear in the only stagy scene in the film, his courtroom trial, that there are no victimless crimes. As in "Cathy Come Home", White holds the viewer's attention with her disarming honesty, vulnerability and spirit. Interesting to see the notorious John Pindin in a prominent role too.

You don't watch a Loach film for comfortable viewing but as an agent-provocateur, turning over stones most would step over, he's an important director in British cinema.

In terms of style this film is revolutionary of the time. It could be defined as docudrama since the film is shot in a style of realism. It portrays 1960's London as a poverty stricken bed of prostitution and crime. The main female protagonist seems to always seek male approval. She leaps from one bed to another, loving each of them in much the same way as Diana does in "Darling" 1965. It is hardly an example of feminism and the Radical changes in women's liberation within the 1960's. It does, however, possess a view of hope through all the grit. Dave shows how even a criminal can be loving, gentle and kind. The film offers the audience a 2 hour exploration into the lives of the criminals in London at the time. It challenges the classic Hollywood narrative of peace, disruption and resolution. The narrative structure seems to float along with very little climaxs. This gives the feeling of realism, which many people may find dull or boring. Don't expect your Hollywood Blockbuster. You will find a challenging Independant British film, documenting the feelings of the 1960s in an innovative and unconventional way.

As mentioned elsewhere, I've been getting into the 'kitchen sink' dramas of Britain in the 1960s. Previously I've watched a handful of the early black and white ones, but POOR COW, the first film from long-time director Ken Loach, offered in a new wave of all-colour pictures that eventually heralded the way for the miserable likes of EASTENDERS and other soaps that came later. POOR COW is a product of its era and it shows, and that's what makes it interesting.

The film is in essence the story of a young mother and her kid and their attempts to get by in a cruel and often harsh world. Carol White achieves level of naturalness in her performance that you don't often see, which means that she's utterly convincing. The male characters are presented as brutes, philanderers, or simply bland, cold men who don't care about the impact they make on people's lives. There's plenty of talent in the supporting cast, a lot of faces who would go on to become familiar on TV and in film, which makes this a fun watch despite the gruelling subject matter.

The thing I found about POOR COW is that it kept me watching. I was always interested in finding out the outcome of the story, although any viewer will immediately realise that it's not going to be a happy ending. I was interested to note that the interlude in which White gets involved with a group of dodgy glamour photographers seemed to inspire a whole sub-genre of films directed by the likes of Norman J. Warren and Pete Walker. Apparently many of the scenes in the film were ad-libbed, which accounts for the slice-of-life realism of the piece.

It is worth noting that The Limey (1999) is a follow up to Poor Cow. The writer of the later film has stated that the similarities between these two films is incidental. However, Steven Soderbergh (the director of The Limey) has said that he specifically intended for his movie to be a sequel to Poor Cow. If you liked Poor Cow you might also want to see The Limey.