Kes

Kes is a film i was aware about all the way back to when i was at school (it was made the year after i was born)but i never got around to seeing it until now and boy am i pleased i did. Rarely is there a film that exudes charm like Kes. The acting is not brilliant , neither is the script but that is what makes this film such a joy. It made me feel i was back at school amongst the self important jumped up teachers and the cruel kids .It made me remember the times when i was a teenager that i didnt care for at the time yet it also made me long to be that age again! The story is of a young lad who through having a bad time at school and with his family he finds solice in training a young bird of prey. David bradley (Casper) is excellent ,as is Brian Glover as the P.E teacher who likes to think he is Bobby Charlton. The scene when he takes the boys out to play football is brilliant . The cinemetography is superb and the haunting music contributes to what can only be described as Very good movie. 8 out of 10.

The beauty of this film lies in the simplicity and purity of its message. If you want to get along, especially in a Northern English mining town in the 60's, do not ever hope for anything better. If you do, the world's gonna come and kick you in the teeth. Discuss.

Billy Casper has an empty life. In trouble with the police for theft, he shares a bed with his brother (a discontent miner willing to take out his frustrations on just about anyone nearby), goes to a school with some dispiriting and brutally repressive teachers, and has nothing to look forward to but the day when he to descends into Hades to work the coalface.

Until Kes comes along. Kes is a kestrel that Billy rears and trains. Kes soars where Billy can only dream. Kes is hope.

Ken Loach is the master of social commentary and I think this is probably his best film. This film embodies what it means to be working class in all the best traditional ways. You work, you do not have ambition, you are surrounded by people who have accepted their lot in life, you cannot hope for better, you won't be allowed to hope for better. If that sounds brutal, it is and so is this film. You aren't told right and wrong, you are told what is. It is thrust in your face for you to deal with.

The best thing about this film are all the characters that surround Billy. All have had all spirit hammered out of them at an early age and are damned if any one else is going to have any. The teachers casual and resigned brutality living what remains of their dreams by playing against the boys on the football field and imagining they are Bobby Charlton (and still losing) is perfectly displayed. The shop keeper's humouring of childish enthusiasm because he knows it ain't going to last. And most of all Billy's brother's spiteful depression. His spirit has been freshly crushed and it still rankles.

And amidst this gloom shines Billy and Kes. They soar above this nightmare like Andy Dufrense soars when he plays opera to the Shawshank inmates. Ken is telling us hope is a jewel to be treasured especially when it is surrounded by those wishing it crushed and buried.

You must see this film, especially if you've seen the Shawshank Redemption. Be warned though, there is no redemption here. Don't be afraid of the accents you non-Yorkshire folk. Just think of it as Wallace and Gromit without the cheese.

If you are not from the north of England you may have difficulty with the dialogue in this film but dont let it put you off this is a masterpiece.The story of a teenage boy with no friends and no hope set in the mining heartland of yorkshire in the sixties is absolutely authentic. He finds salvation from the grim reality of his existence when he rears and trains a young kestrel, which is the only thing in his young life that has any meaning.David Bradley who plays Billy Casper in the leading role is superb.There are many scenes from the film that are absolute gems, but here are a few that warrant a special mention.Brian Glover playing the role of billys physical education teacher is out of this world, why he was never nominated as best supporting actor for an oscar i will never know.Colin Welland (later to become an oscar winner himself for screenplay of chariots of fire) was also brilliant as billys form teacher.The film reaches out to you on many levels. In me it stirred horror, anger, humour and tears.I am quite sure it will also do the same to anyone who views this timeless masterpiece.

Ken Loach's (1969) film of Barry Hines' novel 'A Kestrel for a Knave' is written with Tony Garnett (Producer of 'Cathy Come Home' for BBC TV). Set in a mining community in the north of England it tells the story of young schoolboy Billy Casper (Dai Bradley) and his unexpected attachment to a Kestrel.

We join Billy in a fatherless family where Mum (Lynne Perrie) is struggling to keep things together and retain some semblance of control over Billy's fiery elder brother Jud (Freddie Fletcher).

Suddenly we see the well-established northern working class preoccupation with keeping pigeons elevated to an altogether higher plane as Billy begins to rear a kestrel chick. We follow him as he takes on the most challenging project of his life to date and becomes totally engrossed in learning everything he can about this wonderful bird; soon well on his way to becoming expert in the ancient art of falconry.

At school, Billy finds support from English teacher Mr Farthing (Colin Welland) who is not slow to recognise the impact this bird has had upon Billy's otherwise fractured and impoverished home life.

As Billy's imagination soars with his developing rapport with the bird, we share his keen enthusiasm and rich understanding of the nature of this sharp and noble predator.

But in doing so, we pay the price when Billy's troubled home life intervenes and robs him of what has become the powerful symbol of his ability to transcend the limitations of the tough and unforgiving community of which he is inexorably a part.

This is a great film that captures the unique ability of young people to find meaning and fulfilment in the darkest and most unpromising situations.

Kes is the story of a few weeks in the life of a schoolboy, Billy Casper, against the backdrop of social disintegration that was the north of England in the late 1960s. Billy finds and trains a kestrel, investing in it all the latent energy that his school and rough home life have suppressed, and finding in it a release from the all too present reality of the rest of his existence.

An outstanding performance from David Bradley as Billy glues together the sometimes shaky portrayals of the other characters. As a contemporary social commentary this is a film that has many of the elements you might expect. Billy has an impoverished family with an elder brother working down the pit and a single mother struggling to cope with the situation in which she finds herself. His school is staffed by teachers who react to their part in a failing system with aggression towards the pupils. And he's quite at home with petty crime, stealing a pint from the milkman and a volume to help him train the kestrel from the second hand bookshop. But the film is saved from cliché by the honesty of the acting and the quality of the direction; it seems at times as if we're watching a fly on the wall documentary. The reactions of the boys to the rant and the caning they receive for being caught smoking is entirely natural. Brian Glover as the sadistic games master is all too credible. And the employment interview is too close to my own experience to be fiction.

The film moves to its inevitable and unforgettable conclusion and we're left wondering what happened to Billy Casper after the filming finished.