Synopsis
Daniel Blake (a brilliant Dave Johns) is a widowed joiner caught in a welfare quandary. Due to discrepancies in his medical evaluations, he is forced to apply for jobs he cannot accept, to remain in the benefits system. He befriends Katie, a single mother with two children in a similar predicament. Uncompromising reality is the strength of this dark-humoured polemic. Robbie Ryan’s muted cinematography features an understated sobriety that observes the characters’ downward spiral with a quiet dignity. As affecting vessels condemned by procedural indifference and social prejudice, Johns and newcomer Hayley Squires add a humanitarian urgency to Loach’s didactic yet disarmingly simple narrative. Ten years after his first win with The Wind that Shakes the Barley (2006), director Ken Loach continues his acclaimed streak with this humanistic Palme d’Or winner at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival.