A young woman, Janice, is living with her restrictive and conservative parents, who lead a dull working-class life and consider their daughter to be “misbehaving” whenever she’s trying to find her own way in life. Family Life is a stark and painful portrait of a hypocritical society.
One of Kenneth Loach’s most claustrophobic, coldest and infuriating films. One of his best written and acted on top of that. It’s shot like a documentary and lit like a 70s horror film. Fuck both of these parents smh.
Also that Letterboxd summary is complete word vomit lol, change that shit!
Family Life is a film directed by Ken Loach based on a previous Wednesday Play he had made for the BBC in the 60s entitled In Two Minds. It centres on the troubled life of a young woman, Janice (played by Sandy Ratcliff, who would go on to be one of the first residents of Albert Square in EastEnders) whose mental state becomes increasingly erratic following a abortion she was forced into having by her overbearing parents. Taken into care, the film looks at how society systematically fails Janice - much like Loach's previous Cathy Come Home was an equally unflinching and savage indictment on the failings of society towards those in most need.
As you can probably guess, it's…
Un film trop beau pour ne rien dire, un vrai chef-d'oeuvre de Loach qui, proche de Ronald Laing et du mouvement de l'antipsychiatrie, montre comment on peut faire d'une jeune fille malheureuse et fragile une malade, une folle qui vient perturber le bon fonctionnement et l'équilibre de la société. La jeune Sandy Ratcliff est phénoménale dans un rôle vraiment difficile. Je n'oublierai pas de sitôt ses petites torsions des mains, ses grattages perpétuels et ses cheveux enroulés dans ses doigts, son regard fuyant aussi, tout son corps qui exprime un intense malaise, une difficulté à s'affirmer et un désespoir devant l'absence quasi totale d'écoute, de compréhension et d'empathie. Un film vraiment puissant, d'une vérité et d'une humanité qui m'a profondément bouleversé.
This review was also posted on my blog, 'Destroy All Cinema'.
Yet another defining social drama from the British master that is Ken Loach... but this time one of his most early efforts. What is it about all of these stark and realistic portrayals of Britain in films from the likes of Alan Clarke, Mike Leigh and Ken Loach that, despite being made so many decades ago, STILL rings true with British life today all these years later? Have things really changed that little? You'll have to ask Loach or Leigh that themselves because I've only been stuck here for just over twenty of these years....
What's funny to me about this group of British films, and Family Life especially,…
Janice (Sandy Ratcliffe) is aimless, depressed and constantly and consistently belittled by her overbearing parents (Grace Cave, Bill Dean) caught in a limbo between the modern society of her friends and the static, immovable ways of her parents. Longing to escape but also finding an inability to do so. Janice’s mental illness, particularly following an abortion she is mentally abused into having is so willfully ignored, misunderstood, and begrudged by her parents that she finds herself in the care of the state, whose failings are so completely absolute that the cost it dreadful.
A bleak film which has moments of unbearable realness, Janice’s first, progressive therapist (whose project is ultimately defunded) acting as a mediator and almost documentary interviewer in…
Additional proof (as if any were needed) that Ken Loach can turn his camera to pretty much any social issue or historical milieu and nail it with intelligence and humanity.
Family Life was way ahead of its time in its authentic depiction of one young woman's journey through the mental health 'care' system in 1970's Britain.
A searing portrayal of a teenage girl being constantly let down by both her parents and the state after she is diagnosed with a mental illness. Not many good times here but it’s urgent yet non-provacating tone is impressive from Ken Loach. He’s been walking that line for a long time now to great effect.
For as much as this movie is about how the psychological institutions often let people down by ‘one size fits all treatment’ the more interesting discourse lies in how parents and institutions impose illness onto people. The film almost feels like a kind of statement on gaslighting before this concept entered regular nomenclature. The scenes in which Janice (played well by Sandy Ratcliffe) has to…
Bleak, washed out portrait of a vicious family dynamic captured very starkly by Ken Loach, the term realism takes on a whole new meaning.
There's a really fascinating psychological angle to this about societal prejudice and what is 'Right and wrong' and the underlying need in us to please, disappoint or rebel against our parent figures.
comme je m'attendais à ce que ce soit terriblement nul agréable surprise, c'est pas du tout le style de cinéma qui me touche mais le mec maîtrise son truc, parfois certainement éléments du scénario restent assez déroutants mais l'ensemble offre une cohérence plutôt interessante
les enjeux de l'histoire sont assez bien traités même si la psychophobie ne peut s'empêcher de faire des incursions, pas mal merci ken
porra...achei difícil de ver...que vida reprimida que essa garota sofreu, triste demais....que raiva desses pais e desse sistema manicomial opressor e insensivel...pensei em tanto...a sensação de ser reprimido é ruim demais...a sensação de não poder ser você...
Janice (Sandy Ratcliffe) is aimless, depressed and constantly and consistently belittled by her overbearing parents (Grace Cave, Bill Dean) caught in a limbo between the modern society of her friends and the static, immovable ways of her parents. Longing to escape but also finding an inability to do so. Janice’s mental illness, particularly following an abortion she is mentally abused into having is so willfully ignored, misunderstood, and begrudged by her parents that she finds herself in the care of the state, whose failings are so completely absolute that the cost it dreadful.
A bleak film which has moments of unbearable realness, Janice’s first, progressive therapist (whose project is ultimately defunded) acting as a mediator and almost documentary interviewer in…
Bleak, washed out portrait of a vicious family dynamic captured very starkly by Ken Loach, the term realism takes on a whole new meaning.
There's a really fascinating psychological angle to this about societal prejudice and what is 'Right and wrong' and the underlying need in us to please, disappoint or rebel against our parent figures.
One of Kenneth Loach’s most claustrophobic, coldest and infuriating films. One of his best written and acted on top of that. It’s shot like a documentary and lit like a 70s horror film. Fuck both of these parents smh.
Also that Letterboxd summary is complete word vomit lol, change that shit!
I made it about 40 minutes in and then just skipped around a bit until the end. I love Ken Loach's films so I should have loved this but it just wasn't clicking for me. I think it may have been the fact that this is too real. Like, it felt wrong to watch this girl breakdown.
A girl with an unstable mind finding none of the help she needs in standard psychiatric treatment or her family. Made worse, really. All sides stumbling with how to deal with her, forcing her to bend to them rather than they to her. Something felt off in the acting, but still a really powerful, frustrating movie. Went with the most devastating ending possible.
CW: Mental Health Issues
Family Life centres around a 19-year old girl named Janice who lives in a dull working-class neighbourhood with her restrictive and conservative parents – as she attempts to find her own way in life with her boyfriend Tim. She becomes pregnant, but then her parents force her into having an abortion – and they become increasingly more and more restrictive with how they treat Janice, causing Janice to experience an extended nervous breakdown – which her parents chalk down to her “misbehaving.” Her behaviour becomes increasingly more erratic, which results in her being subjugated to increasingly aggressive psychiatric treatment – slowly disintegrating her life and her central autonomy as a result.
What really shines with this…
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