“Life isn't fair then is it. Somebody always draws the short straw”
Mike Leigh, an English director who with little money still pulls of movies that can be considered the best films in British history. I must admit, a lot of Leigh’s films don’t appeal to me, but I know if I gave it a try I would love it. I rarely see his films get bad reviews and most of his low budget films always become the favourite’s when shown in the Cannes festival.
Secrets and Lies is a film looking into the lives of a Hortense Cumberbatch, a successful black optometrist who is adopted. One day she decides to trace her family history and finds out her real mother, Cynthia Purley, is a white working class woman. The two couldn’t be more different, Hortense has a successful job, living in a nice area of and speaks good English, while her mother is struggling to make ends meet and seems very depressed and house bound. When they meet each other, conversations seem very awkward and theirs a sense of Cynthia feeling very uncomfortable being in the company of her daughter, later where told that she just very embarrassed for adopting her. After weeks of getting to know each other, both become very attached to each other.
The Story also takes a look at Cynthia’s brother Maurice and her other daughter Roxanne. Roxanne is a street cleaner and becomes very clear that she doesn’t get along with her mother. Their always arguing which always end’s up in one of them storming out the room or house. Cynthia’s daughter is a street cleaner who hates her job, this evidently shows that their struggling for money. Maurice the brother is a successful photographer in London and is happily married. He is worried about Cynthia’s state and decides to organise a party for Roxanne’s upcoming birthday. With nobody knowing anything about Hortense, Cynthia decides it would be a good idea to tell everyone that she has another daughter, however when she reluctantly tells her family at the party about her child, the family take it bad resulting in Roxanne storming out.
Mike Leigh who is obsessed about making movies about middle and working class people directs it well, he makes sure that it is easily identifiable which class a person fits into by the area and the state of the lives a person has. The movies tend to be successful to as a lot of the audience can relate to the film as a lot of his films are based on real life problems.
It’s a shame that the majority of his films don’t even make it to the cinema, the usual procedure of his movies is normally, being shown at a film festival then straight to DVD. You’re lucky if it’s even on television. Due to the low budgets of his film’s, it’s hard to advertise his work so he relies a lot of websites, newspapers etc reviewing the film and letting the public know. Of course now that he is a successful director, his work is much more identifiable.
Mike Leigh is very loyal to his actors and actresses who work for him, so much so that he uses the majority of actors in most of his movies. The like’s of Timothy Spall (Harry Potter, Sweeney Todd) and Jim Broadbent (Gangs of New York, Bridget Jones) have appeared in numerous of movies directed by Leigh including All or Nothing and Happy Go Lucky.
Secrets and Lies deservedly won a few Bafta’s including Best screenplay and Best British film and was very successful at the Cannes Film Festival. It is often included in Britain’s top 100 film’s including BBC’s list. Mike Leigh certainly knows how direct movies whether it’s a dark subject or a subject everyone can relate too. Their’s no doubt that Leigh’s movies have regarded him one of the best directors Britain have to offer.
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