Rent I, Daniel Blake (2016)

Hardship and degradation captured brilliantly - I, Daniel Blake review by PT

If you've ever been unlucky enough to be out of work you'll know how accurate this film is. It has a gritty realistic feel this film, almost documentary in parts, a typical Ken Loach vehicle.

The system is made so difficult and demoralising it begs the question the film asks, is it that way to make people forget their claim. Of course there are people with money in between jobs, who can ride it out until their next employment, thereby avoiding the whole belittling ordeal. Conversely, there are the rest of society who must put up with all the obstacles as they need the states money to survive. The latter are then hit with sanction action (having their job seekers allowance stopped) for not honouring to the letter, their JSA agreement. Do the staff in job seekers allowance have sanction targets to meet?

Anyway, Dave John's and Hayley Squires play the lead roles in a wonderful understated way. The two characters desperate for their allowances to survive and both hit with sanction action. Their desperation leading these two honest and decent people into things they wouldn't ever have considered doing to survive.

Very realistic and very good.

I, Daniel Blake - I, Daniel Blake review by HE

I was thoroughly involved with the characters in this film and their dilemmas. I found it honest and heartbreaking to watch, another Ken Loach triumph. I dreaded the ending which you kind of anticipated might happen and it did. Thank goodness there were some of the minor characters who were not jobsworths and were there to help, like the food bank staff and the sympathetic staff member in the benefit office; they are out there these kind people. A great piece of work and a lesson for our time.

A tale of our times. - I, Daniel Blake review by RhysH

Food and shelter are the prerequisites for a decent life but if the shelter is substandard housing and the food comes from a food bank there is nothing decent about the life. Once more Ken Loach tells it like it is, no punches pulled. Daniel Blake collides head on with the Kafkaesque bureaucracy that stalls his every effort towards dignity. Despite the dreadful plight he is in, Dave Jones plays Blake with a lightness of touch although you are very aware of the seething anger just below the surface.

A great street cameo from Malcolm Shields.

Thought provoking - I, Daniel Blake review by AM

The tendency of the comfortable to slag off the people on benefits is utterly deflated in this Ken Loach film, reminiscent of his Cathy Come Home so long ago, focussing on the homeless. It is a heartbreaking view of the lack of empathy by those assessing desperate need with typical by-the-book attitudes. Everything has to be on line in order to get anywhere illustrating how useless modern technology is when dealing with human tragedy. A brilliant film, brilliantly acted. Watch it.

If it makes you ashamed to live in this society... - I, Daniel Blake review by RCO

....(and it should), then you need to do something about it.

I am furious that we treat well meaning people in this way. It is shameful that we have so lost touch with human values that workers can put up with dishing out this inhuman treatment to those who find themselves in difficulties.

Where there is a direct human connection - as shown between Daniel and Katie and the others who he lives around there is mutual support and care. Where "The System" intervenes between human relationships as shown between Daniel and the staff who are supposed to support him it is totally broken.

Possibly the only way to fix it is to burn down all social insecurity and nojob centres and start again. Those jobs (the benefits staff) should not exist in that form - lets do away with them and replace them with a system that actually works for people.

Just a couple of 'what if's' - I, Daniel Blake review by JK

I am unable to match the eloquence of previous reviewers all of whom appear to have a mastery of the English language. This leads me to think that the majority of people who watched this film are middle class and educated - Guardian readers and BBC 4 watchers. I may be (and hope) I am totally wrong with this assumption.

The film is brilliant, well acted and shows up the naivety of a system designed by people who have obviously never had to become involved in the benefits system themselves - much the same way as the people who run the NHS have never been ill or have private medical insurance.

I cannot fault this film but for one niggling thought: What is the two main characters were not 'attractive' or 'fine, morally astute people.'?

What if they had been fat or slovenly or swore a lot or stole things other than necessities from shops? What if their children were not incredibly photogenic or cute or had scabies or physical deformities? Would our sense of righteous indignation at their plight have been as strong as it was calculated to have been?

Polemical rant by a hero of the left - I, Daniel Blake review by PV

The first thing to say is Ken Loach (who some on the left worship) directed this BUT he did not write it. The screenplay is by someone called Paul Laverty. He deserves credit. Ken Loach did not write this!!!

The second thing is the weird paradox here. Ken Loach is criticising the way the state treats people. BUT as a hardcore socialist, his solution to all problems is more state interference and control. Square that circle if you can! Most people are appalled by the exponential rise in things like housing benefit payments - many to immigrants - and want that cut. I don't know anyone of any political colour who'd want to force someone who's just had a heart attack back to work.

So, in a way this is poverty porn. It's also polemic at times, not drama. The final scene reminds of the final scene in Charlie Chaplin's The Great Dictator with its propaganda. One wonders if those who praise this film to the skies would be equally impressed if a film were made promoting the alternative view with a speech at the end saying how many truly poor people were suffering because of uncontrolled mass immigration and the vast sums of housing benefit paid to them! But then, this movie is preaching to the converted...

Having said all that, I enjoyed watching this film - though it was at times massively predictable (I could see the ending coming after the first 10 minutes). An unlikely subplot re trainers adds some ethnic flavour - but there's not much of that in Newcastle.

I enjoyed listening to the Geordie dialect and accent - if 'Scots' is supposedly a language (I do not accept it is anything but a dialect of English) then so is Geordie, and Cockney, and many more regional accents.

The way the state deals with people in all countries is awful - Loach may worship socialism, but having lived in a socialist state and waited 3 hours to be seen re a residence permit, I'd advise Loach to travel more! In many EU countries they make it as hard as possible for anyone to claim benefit (France, Greece etc). And of course in many EU countries there is NO benefit - no housing benefit at all in Spain and Italy, for example.

So, all in all, worth watching - but deeply and political rather smug and convinced its belief in a socialist solution is right. So irritating on that level. But not as irritating as other Ken Loach movies (which rewrite history according to his own leftwing bias).

The acting here is superb - with improvisation really working. But I wish they'd cut the loud angry Scotsman in the graffiti scene. We see more than enough Scots on our screens anyway, thanks to the BBC's Scottish Raj. Time to go home to STV and BBC's new Scotland channel which is costing us all more than BBC4.