Amazon.com

The brilliant writer-director Mike Leigh (Topsy-Turvy, Secrets and Lies, Naked) has crafted an utterly compelling movie about one of the most controversial of topics. An irrepressibly hopeful housecleaner in 1950s London named Vera Drake (Imelda Staunton, Antonia and Jane, Shakespeare in Love) mothers everyone around her, from her own family to helpless shut-ins and lonely men living in tiny, isolated apartments. None of these people know that Vera also helps young women get rid of unwanted pregnancies, until the police appear and tear her world apart. Vera Drake isn't just an inspired character portrait; through simple and straightforward scenes, the movie weaves a quiet but mesmerizing portrait of how people--both wealthy and poor--cope with adversity. Though wrenching, Vera Drake has too much life to be depressing. Leigh is deservedly famous for his work with actors; every character brims with truth and Staunton's performance deserves every award it could possibly win. --Bret Fetzer ... Read more

Reviews (50)

** Subtly Beautiful **
The main actress (Imelda Staunton) who plays the charachter Vera Drake did a fine job in this movie.The movie does not hit you over the head with moral preaching about abortion ... it gives you very subtle emotions based on how those around Vera Drake respond to what she is doing when she is found out.There is no happy ending here.It is not a feel good movie, but just the same it is beautiful.I believe Imelda Staunton was nominated for an Oscar for this role.Hillary Swank (who I love) won the Best Actress Oscar this year for her role in Million Dollar Baby (another fabulous movie).I'd say between the two of them, its a tough call.

Incredible film
Genre: Drama, Foreign (English language)

Genre Grade: A

Final Grade: A

This was an amazing film about a nice little old lady doing something she believed was right. She was so innocent in her ways that she did not realize the gravity of what she was doing. Or perhaps she did but truly did not feel any remorse or wrongdoing in what she did. The acting from Imelda Staunton was superb (no wonder she was nominated for so many awards), and the story itself is extremely sad but holds a powerful message. It offers no strong conclusion, but leaves it up to the viewer to decide whether the fate of Vera Drake was fair or not.

I have my own views on abortion (which most of you know that I am strongly against it), but I can't help but appreciate the message this movie brings forth. It reminded me of The Cider House Rules in that its message gave some hint to how pro-choice people feel. It is important to me to understand controversial issues before making firm opinions on them, but even then I am never for sure, because I strongly believe that it is up to the individual to believe what they wish to believe. I am anti-abortion, but I don't think my views should be enforced on people who feel differently.

Sorry for the social commentary, I realize this is only supposed to be a movie review. Just pass it off as bad journalism.

Overwhelming
This is an important movie about the moral dilemma posed by abortion. Abortions, legal or illegal, have always been performed, and women from all social strata, have always found themselves in need of a helping hand, whether the law upheld that kind of help at particular times or not. The movie shows this by juxtaposing the women whom Vera Drake helps, who cannot pay for abortion, with those who can pay to have an abortion done by a doctor, or by showing that in some cases at least, abortion cannot be totally repudiated. We witness two such cases in the film as one woman becomes pregnant, we understand, after a man forces himself on her, or as another woman, who already has seven children, and whose husband just doesn't understand how consuming this is, cannot have an eighth. The film convincingly shows how women have to deal with their problems in secrecy, in back chambers, and continue to live life as usual and pretend that these things don't happen.

Vera Drake is a kind and generous woman, too kind and too generous, the movie shows, for the world surrounding her, the cruelty of which is encapsulated in the woman who procures "clients" for her, pocketing money from these women without Vera's knowledge, as well as doing Vera the favour of selling her various food products (such as sugar) of which, we understand, there was a shortage in those postwar years.

Imelda Staunton gives an overwhelming performance, exhibiting Vera's kindness, reliability, generosity, naivete, heartbreak, sense of shame, and, finally, despair, with great credibility. I agree with some of the other reviewers who state that the movie doesn't try to take sides. And yet I think that the police detective and the woman police constable's kindness to Vera suggest that they feel sympathy for her and even understand what she did and why she did it. I especially felt that as a woman, the female PC knows that this is a problem all women are in danger of encountering, and this could be a pointer towards interpretation of the movie. I don't know whether this is what the director intended to suggest, but I think that this is something that came across, the way I saw it at least. This is possibly one aspect of the strength of this film, that it allows for this interpretation.

All performances were riveting and convincing, the cinematography superb, the 50s austerity convincingly recreated. As some reviewers have already noted, the film is quite bleak and depressing. It is supposed to be, given the subject that it treats. It is a matter of the viewer coming prepared for a film which tackles a hard to swallow, painful, yet central,social issue. The series of abortions that Vera performs is emotionally draining, though not graphic, and the end is demoralizing. But all the more realistic and powerful in being so.

I highly recommend the film, provided the viewer knows what to expect. It's not meant to be a feel good movie, but a movie to make one think and debate. It may depress you to some extent, but I don't think it will leave you indifferent. Personally, I felt that the film is subtly but convincingly suggesting that there is no use trying to pretend that abortions don't happen / shouldn't happen,won't happen, and that the law and society do not / did not have the compassion necessary to deal with this problem faced by women. You may come to a different conclusion, but the point is that the film is strong enough to provoke discussion and possibly disagreement amongst its viewers.

Masterful
What a difficult pleasure "Vera Drake" is.It is a film that has great acting and writing, yet deals with a controversial subject that is no less hard to approach now than it was in 1950, when the story takes place.The word "abortion" isn't even mentioned until the film is near it's end, but the watcher knows precisely what is being dealt with long before that.

Imelda Staunton is truly powerful in the title role, a simple woman who only wants to help others.As soon as she appears on the screen, one is drawn into her life and family.We follow Vera as she does what she can to make life easier for those around her. We see the consequences of Vera's "assistance" in areas that the world she lived in hadn't figured out how to deal with yet. In the end, I left the film wondering why we still haven't come to grips with this issue 55 years after the events in this film took place.

this movie is so beautiful
I always thought that this movie was going to be bad and boring, but I was wrong, this one is brilliant, it's very special for it's content, Imelda makes a great performance, it's plot is very dramatic,it's so beautiful, if you are looking for good drama don't miss this one. ... Read more

Album Description

Asian only All Code / NTSC DVD. 1996 British film directed by the amazing Mike Leigh (Naked, Career Girls) & starring Timothy Spall, Phyllis Logan & Brenda Blethyn. Leonard Maltin said, 'Another of filmmaker Leigh's compelling portraits of ordinary people ... Read more

Reviews (49)

A triumph
A mild-mannered, intelligent young black woman (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) tracks down her birth mother, Cynthia Purley (Brenda Blethyn), who just happens to be white. That's only the central plot thread in Mike Leigh's very poignant, very funny, very smart family drama, which received well-deserved Oscar nominations for best picture, best director, best actress, best supporting actress, and best original screenplay. A keenly observed piece set in middle-class and upper middle-class England, "Secrets & Lies" offers such an abundance of riches it's hard to know where to begin.

The plot is fairly simple, though the emotions beneath it aren't. Cynthia is initially afraid to meet the child she gave up years ago, but eventually opens up and discovers that her long-lost daughter, Hortense, is not only a sweet and refined young lady, but the possible source of the love and affection she wants so badly. She receives none of that sort of attention from her other daughter, Roxanne, a bitter, sharp-tongued council worker who, like her secret half-sister, was conceived out of wedlock. Adding to the tension is Cynthia's relationship with her brother, Maurice, and his socially ambitious wife, Monica. The latter is pained by her inability to have a child, and particularly despises Cynthia, who is able to bear children but, in Monica's mind, unable to provide them with the family environment and opportunities that she can. All of these threads converge at an afternoon birthday party, during which all the pent-up secrets and lies explode like a sequence of fireworks. Emotions are laid bare, the past is revealed, and finally, the film hints, the healing process can begin.

A synopsis really doesn't do full justice to the sheer impact of this film. In fact, it's almost insulting--and irrelevant--to discuss plot at all. "Secrets & Lies" isn't about plot in the conventional sense; it's about people. Each character is a complex, fully realized human being, brought to life by superior acting. Brenda Blethyn in particular does a spectacular job, and her Cynthia emerges as one of the most hilarious, endearing, and noble human portraits I've ever seen captured on film. Marianne Jean-Baptiste has a less showy role, but she occupies it with equally genuine warmth and humility. The other performances are consistently excellent, with Timothy Spall (Maurice) and Phyllis Long (Monica), who play tortured but thoroughly sympathetic characters, among the standouts.

The actors are complimented by Leigh's superb direction. Each shot has clearly been carefully thought-out, but the camera is so unobtrusive, so casually observing, that it lends "Secrets & Lies" an almost documentary-like feel. And yet, Leigh's compassion for all his characters leaks through every frame. One of the best scenes in the film takes place in a teashop, with Cynthia and Hortense sharing a first meeting that moves from initial awkwardness to humor and hilarity, to intense sadness and finally to catharsis and relief. The scene is an unbroken, unedited single shot lasting for nearly eight minutes, and Blethyn and Jean-Baptiste sustain the dramatic tension for that long without missing a beat. It is a seamless culmination of acting, writing, and cinematography, and represents (I think) one of the most remarkable and honest shots ever committed to celluloid.

Therein lies the secret to the success of "Secrets & Lies"--every moment in the film feels real. That quality is aided by the fact that, as is the case in all of Leigh's other films, the screenplay is a collaboration between both writer/director and actors. The dialogue never sounds scripted or contrived because most of it has been improvised by the actors themselves; thus, it's no wonder that the characters all but leap off the screen, and that spending time with them is such an engaging and rewarding experience.

Some have criticized the film's overly "happy" ending, claiming that it feels a bit too pat to be real. I disagree. The conclusion, though admittedly more optimistic a resolution than most conflicted families can expect, remains utterly true to the characters' personalities and backgrounds. Actually, Leigh trumps the notion that all films attempting to illuminate the human condition must be overly bleak and pessimistic.

"Secrets & Lies" is not a fast-paced film, and at 152 minutes, it's quite long. It could have gone on for hours and hours as far as I was concerned. Mike Leigh has confirmed my long-held notion that American cinema could definitely learn a thing or two from the sure-and-steady British. Without a doubt, one of the best films, if not the best, of 1996.

"Why can't we share our pain?"
I would call this Mike Leigh's masterpiece, only I've seen many films by this brilliant director since screening this unfairly overlooked gem, and I feel ANY of his movies could be categorized as a "masterpiece".

The movie centers on a black woman named Hortense (the multi-talented Marianne Jean-Baptiste) who, knowing she is adopted, is in the process of trying to discover the identity of her birth mother. She finds her real mother, a lower-class white woman named Cynthia Purley (Brenda Blethyn). Cynthia, unaware that Hortense is trying to look her up, has a more immediate problem - a rebellious daughter, Roxanne (the unfairly ignored Claire Rushbrook), who has no respect for her because of Cynthia's many affairs. Cynthia is also trying to reach out to her successful photographer-brother, Morris (perennial Leigh favorite Timothy Spall), but she can't quite get close to him because of the influence of Morris's seemingly cold wife, Monica (Phyllis Logan).

If anyone knows anything of Mike Leigh's style of direction, you'll know why this film is so amazing . . Leigh doesn't simply write a screenplay and tell the actors what to do, he allows them to improvise and develop the characters themselves; the result is that these characters are more than just one-dimensional cardboard cutouts. ALL of these characters are unable to be categorized; they have characteristics that are UNIQUE and that make us care about them. Their complexity is illustrated not only in their actions and by what they say, but by what is NOT done or said in specific instances. ACTIONS of the characters are important (notice, for example, Hortense's inability to react emotionally, even in the family setting, or her reluctance to touch anyone). Another interesting feature is the way Leigh juxtaposes scenes of Morris taking pictures in his photography shop with the events of the story; we even become enamored by the characters that are seen only briefly, for a second, behind Morris's lens, posing for photographs. The cinematography also helps to add to the film's realism; it has a camcorder effect, without being at all shaky or deficient in sound quality.

Finally, the ending: Some may find the ending overly sentimental; I found it remarkably real (and nowhere NEAR as sugary sweet as those found in Hollywood films). Let me only say that it succeeds in that the viewer isn't given total resolution, yet he is given HOPE; these characters CAN work out their problems with each other, and it raises a question that I (as one who is no stranger to family feuding), find very convicting: why, in family situations, do people so often choose to alienate themselves and suffer alone (often even punishing their loved ones, as illustrated by Roxanne and Monica), instead of SHARING their pain and helping one another?

A great film . .worthy of much praise and able to withstand repeated viewings because of the depth of the story and the people involved. Here's hoping Mike Leigh will retain his style of filmmaking for years to come.

touching and realistic and simply incredibly little gem
This is a little known but absolutely wonderful film that, corny as this sounds, deserves to be shared by many.A small film about a family and the small day to day trials and tribulations they go through.It's very realistic and deals with the the most average everyday things.What makes this film so amazing is how it is able to present this window into the lives of this group of people with such wit and insight, sadness and honesty; ultimately resulting in a film which is tender and uplifting and hopeful.

Tha acting is simply awesome. No other words to put it.Everyone from Brenda Blethyn to Timothy Spall to Marianna Jean Baptiste, to Claire Rushbrook, all take turns stealing scenes in performances that are so natural and on point that at times, it doesn't even feel like they're acting. This is true acting that cuts straight to the heart.The script is wonderful in that it provides so many little details that one wouldn't think to include in a movie. Just the smallest things which somehow bring the characters to life.

A wonderful film that is never going to get any acclaim because this is all about the actors.No special effects or halle berry sex scenes. No way-this is an actor's film.And they steal the show.If you have taste in REAL cinema, do not miss this gem of a movie.IT IS SIMPLY WONDERFUL.

On How Life Is
This superbly acted and written drama is certainly one of the best british movies of the 90`s, dealing with human feelings and relationhips in an unique, realistic and powerful way. Like the best british movies out there, it wisely combines drama and comedy, creating a meaningful portrayal of life.

The story focuses a young black woman`s (Marianne Jean-Baptiste)quest to find her real mother who abandoned her as a child (Brenda Blethyn). Problem is, her mother`s life is currently a mess and that new element ends up generating some problems, conflicts and tensions in the family.

Mike Leigh`s direction offers time and room for his actors to develop the characters, creating three-dimensional individuals who seem real everyday people. The scenes are very well crafted, with close attention to detail and strong, credible dialogue. The performances are all terrific and natural, and the story flows well although the pace is a bit slow at times. It`s certainly one of the most interesting movies about family ties and the need of belonging somewhere, also focusing the differences and personality flaws that keep people away from each other.

At times sad and moving, in other moments cheerful and uplifting, "Secrets & Lies" presents the necessary but at times difficult experience of family reunion in a realistic way.
A worthwile, poignant drama with much to recommend.

One Lie I Wish Filmakers Would Stop Telling
I would be dishonest if I did not compliment Leigh and his cast on such beautifully acted roles interwoven in such a sweetly told story, but why on Earth do movie makers persist in using actors who so very obviously have two black parents to portray mixed race people? Jean-Baptiste's Hortense is superbly explored and bought to life, but as a parent of mixed race children I found it difficult to suspend disbelief in being asked to accept that she had a white mother (a sentiment echoed by many in the mixed race community). A trivial criticism most of you will cry, but this type of miscasting does a disservice to reality and serves only to propagate hypodescent myths regarding mixed race people. ... Read more

Reviews (96)

A most enjoyable experience
Naturally, as the DVD is not yet released this review is on the movie which should appear uncut on the DVD. It makes one realise the depth of theatrical talent in the UK when one can produce show like this with a large cast and not know one of the performers. Don't let this be a concern. The show is realistic, to the best that one knows of the life and times of Gilbert and Sullivan. It really shows their interaction, not always perfect, their failings, personally and in business, all of which makes you feel that you know them well, so realistic are the settings and the script. The humourous interludes are plenty and the music, superb. In the theatre and I would surmise on the DVD, the soundtrack is exceptional. You do not need to be a G & S enthusiast to have a pleasurable three hours of entertainment, musically and theatrically. I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a movie as much and it deserves as many awards as can be offered. Strongly recommended. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Writer-director Mike Leigh, after a brief detour into the period drama of Topsy-Turvy, returns to the lives of contemporary working-class Brits. Phil (longtime Leigh collaborator Timothy Spall, Secrets and Lies) is a quiet taxi driver whose marriage to Penny (Lesley Manville) has gone dry, though neither has quite realized it. They bicker with each other and their children and try to find some pleasure in going out with friends, but their friends have their own struggles--even Penny's coworker Maureen (Ruth Sheen), whose naturally buoyant personality is colliding with her resentful daughter's pregnancy. All or Nothing is among Leigh's bleakest films; the relentless misery of these characters' lives is hard to take. But thanks to the incredibly committed acting, when moments of tenderness come, they have a devastating impact. --Bret Fetzer ... Read more

Reviews (15)

Liegh Wins Again
Granted, this movie is not for all tastes. It's virtually unrelenting look at the struggling working class of Britain can be bleak and troubling. However, for those who frequent the local art house, and those who have found themselves drawn to the previous work of Mike Leigh it is a must.

Timothy Spall and Lesley Manville are a common-law couple who work as a taxi drive and a grocery store checker respectively. They are raising two teenagers, a shy, bookish daughter who works as a janitor of a nursing home and a son who does little but verbally abuse his mother while he sits in front of the TV. Plot here is not the emphasis. Slice of life is.

Bleak as this scenario sounds (and it only scratches the surface) this is a film that rewards the patient viewer as the ending does offer a healthy dose of redemption. Along the way the acting shines (typical for Leigh films) with Spall, Manville, and Ruth Sheen as the friend and neighbor dealing with a pregnant teen age daughter turning in award worthy performances.

Leigh, The Lady Godiva of British Film Direction
Darling of the British movie elite, Mike Leigh indulgently delves yet again into his peculiar facination with a largely ficticious and fanciful working class, more Dickensian than it is contemporary. Ugly, uncouth, incoherent and nihilistic, 'All or Nothing' is an often cumbersomely self-conscious piece of drivel, offset only by one or two touching scenes between Timothy Spall and Lesley Manville. The film leaves this viewer wondering if Leigh has actually ever met people from the English working class, since the films characters are such appalingly carricatured Fag Ash Lil and Andy Capp types. Infantile and disciplinary impotent adults vie with teenagers whose script consists largely of "fak orf" whenever their parents address them. Certain scenes appear as random flights of fancy offering no insight or even evident connection with the plot (such as it is). Taxi driver Phil (Spall) drives off to the beach after switching his radio off. Standing balefully looking out to sea we are unsure whether he is contemplating suicide or lamenting the one that got away on his last fishing trip. Next cut to Phil driving back home. Huh?
'All or Nothing' may appear to be the stuff of "gritty realism" to Leigh and the cosy arthouse world he inhabits, but in truth it indicates just how out of touch with the real-life subjects he and his cohorts truly are.

The life as a depressing thing
I think that Mr. Leigh is a truly good director. His work is honest, not common in cinema show.
But, "All or Nothing" is really depress movie. From the begginning to the end. All is full of problems. It's like a clichè: poor people, weak people, unsmart people, unhappy people, unsane people, violent people, fat people, ugly people.
C'mon Mr. Leigh: life's not too good, but on the other hand, it's not too bad. Please put your great gift in the other side of life and you give us a smile¡ You can do this¡

prozac nation, if they could find some!
Just like all of Leigh's films, you commit to them and want to own them. This one however, has no real comic relief and frankly I couldn't shake the mild depression I developed while watching. Be careful, this a great movie but a real downer.

Top Notch
Difficult, but very much worthwhile ensemble piece from British director and all around film genius Mike Leigh.

The story, as it is, revolves around a group of people living virtually hand to mouth in a London housing project. The class consciousness of British society, as it so often is in Leigh films, is on full display here as is the absolute top notch acting another mainstay of Leigh movies.

This isn't the best movie in Leigh's cannon, but it speaks volumes about Leigh and his vision that even one of his "lesser" films still warrants five stars. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Timeless comedy in a 1970s setting
This wonderfully comic play can be viewed at many levels:

- A clash of classes (Beverley and the neighbouring couple are working class; her husband Lawrence aspires to be middle class; and Abigail's Mum is upper middle.)

- A conflict of skills (Beverley as the stay-at-home, childless wife doesn't work, doesn't cook and orders poor Lawrence to do virtually everything, whereas her apparently inept neighbour comes into her own as nurse at the climax of the play.)

- As an allegory on the white man's departure from Africa. At the time of the play's creation, Britain was negotiating its exit from Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia). Abigail's posh Mum doesn't know whether to leave the partygoers to it -- possibly causing havoc -- or to interfere herself, or to ask Lawrence to go round and report back.

Whichever way you look at it, it's tremendous fun throughout, with a flawless performance by Alison Steadman as Beverley. There are some fantastic lines, most of them uttered by Janine Duvitski (who went on to star in ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE), such as "I've got very beautiful lips" (you have to see Steadman's reaction), and "We're so alike" (ditto).

Strangely the weakest performance is by Tim Stern as Lawrence, who never totally convinces as the stressed-out, over-sensitive estate agent who thinks he's cultured because he owns a set of Shakespeare's works which he never expects to read.

The accompanying featurette is all too short, but it's pretty clear that this play simply wouldn't have existed without Alison Steadman's demonic creation. Mike Leigh may have been the writer/ director, but Beverley was based on an Essex woman and a cosmetics demonstrator whom Steadman met prior to the improvisations.

The DVD picture quality is a good as you could possibly expect from a BBC 1970s studio production. The 1970s decor comes up wonderfully! ... Read more

Amazon.com

This early Mike Leigh film was made for British television in 1983 (released theatrically in 1985), and introduced both Gary Oldman and Tim Roth. Set in the Thatcher era, the story--typically for Leigh--is more a matter of dramatic evolution than a conventionally realized script. The action revolves around a middle-class family whose male members are all on the government dole, and whose matriarch (Marion Bailey) is long-suffering in the sight of her two sons, one a half-wit (Roth) and the other a cynical bum (Phil Daniels). Oldman plays the latter's skinhead pal, mostly a goof with no future, and Alfred Molina portrays a relative of the brothers strongly resistant to nudging their lives in a more constructive direction. The story, such as it is, is actually a series of discrete, deceptively unambitious, and highly entertaining scenes that could just as easily stand on their own as belong to some greater whole. Leigh, not quite fully baked as a filmmaker in the early 1980s, occasionally engages a rather obvious wit, such as shooting a long take in a laundry room from an angle that favors the sight of a washing machine and ignores the characters from the waist up. The remarkable actors, however, are as deeply immersed in their roles as in any of Leigh's work, and the film is ultimately as moving and funny as one expects from this unique director. --Tom Keogh ... Read more

Reviews (10)

meantime
This realist picture of the british working class was orginally made just for T.V. The reason it is now realeased on video is proberbly due to its highly noteworthy cast and the fact its directed by Mike Leigh. However "Meantime" truely deseaves to be rediscoved- its a little gem! Set on a council estate in London, Leigh masterfully caputures the sights and sounds of his environment. The film centres around the unemployed Pollock family, particually sons Mark and Colin. Mark(Phil Daniels) has an attitude of frankness and nihilism, not unlike that of johney in Leighs "Naked". Colin(Tim Roth) on the other hand is slow witted, confused and vunerable to the outside world. Through-out the film we sense Marks well guarded affection for his younger brother as he trys desperatly to protect him. Like most Leigh films "Meantime" is mostly improvised, and as usual, he has a fine ensemble of actors who wont disappoint. Daniels and Roth are both equally convincing and absorbing in their roles- they even look like brothers! Gary Oldman makes his debut and theatens to steal the whole show as impish, skinhead Coxy. But perhaps the most commendable performance here belongs to Marion Bailey as the middle class aunt who attempts to put an optomistic smile on their situation(only to have her good intensions torn apart by Mark). This film may be to bleak and low-key for some viewers. There is no real story line to speak of, but it is a very pure piece of art. I'd recomend it to anyone who is willing to look beneath the surface.

Tim Roth & Gary Oldman is the best...
This movie is a great movie...to see Tim Roth and Gary Oldman when they first started out is a treat..in this movie they were kids...Roth was around 18-19 when he made this role.
I enjoyed this film a raw and gritty look at a working class family and their friends..the stand out performances are Roth and Oldman incredible.......
..i hope the distributors of Made in Britain makes this movie and the meantime/made in britain double pack availble to regional 1 folks.......

One Star for the DVD only
Don't buy this DVD. The sound is bad. The dialect in Leigh's films can be hard enough for us Yanks without having it be virtually inaudible and painfully blotted out by the music. The mix of this DVD is really bad and it spoils the movie. That said, the movie is fantastic; too bad the DVD does it such an injustice.

Don't buy this DVD.
The sound [is bad]. Leigh's characters' dialect is hard enough to understand sometimes but on this DVD the dialogue is inaudible and much softer than the music itself, which blots it out most of the time. Frustrating -- because the movie is fantastic.

A wonderful movie, an awful DVD
I'd give the movie five stars. The problem is, the DVD release from Fox Lorber is awful. There's something seriously wrong with the soundtrack; the dialog elements are drowned out by the music, and there's a synchronization problem that often leaves the left and right channel staggered by about half a second. Even more distracting, added sound effects often come from the wrong channel compared to the supposed visual source of the sound.

My guess is that instead of using a properly mixed mono soundtrack, Fox Lorber went back to the multi-channel master tapes for the mono soundtrack and used them as a fake stereo master -- but did a really bad job on the mix.

Whatever the technical explanation, it ruined my enjoyment of the movie. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Classic Bristish Comedy
I remember watching this along time ago.... In a couple of Weeks i will own it on Dvd.....The Story goes there is a New couple that move into a New house, Only to have the Sister in-law calling round EVERY DAY...Until the Brother in-law had enough and throws her out..Just like a Woman she SCREAMMS the street down..With this the Sister in-law Is then Chase into the Neighbours house ((Who just happened to been there old school teachers))The comedy Really starts there, You will witness a tug of war between the new Couple and Teachers, as They all end up on the Stairs with the Sister in-law holding onto the stair rail for dear life, With her sister and brother in-law (New couple) trying to get her out of the Neighbours House....If you got a good sense of Humour and want a GOOD OLD FASHION BRITISH FILM, then BUY THIS..!!! Promise u will Laugh..!!! ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Ebert's review of U.S.premiere
The first American review of "Bleak Moments," written in November 1972 by Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times:

There is a new kind of movie emerging in the 1970s that considers, with almost frightening perceptiveness, the ways people really behave toward each other. These new movies--with their attention to the smallest nuances of human behavior--are scary because they tell us so much about ourselves. They're interested in the ways that body language and the territorial imperative operate in human relationships. Most of us don't walk into a saloon like John Wayne or drink a beer like Karen Black, but we do have a set of personal responses and cues that let other people know how to react to us. We have the cues, and we read the cues of others. Until last week, I had only seen one movie that I felt was completely successful in this new way of telling a story: Eric Rohmer's "My Night at Maud's." That was a film in which a personal drama was told, not in words, but in the ways the characters acted toward each other. Many of their words in fact, were an evasion of the situation--but Rohmer was able to give us the words to show the evasion. Now comes Mike Leigh's "Bleak Moments." It is a first film by a young British director who exhibits in every scene a complete mastery of the kind of characterization he is attempting. The film is not entertaining in any conventional way. This is not to say for a moment that it is boring or difficult to watch; on the contrary, it deals so basically with the pain and utter frustration of life that it is impossible not to watch. Its greatness is not just in direction or subject, but in the complete singularity of the performances. There have never been performances just like this before in the movies; Annie Raitt and Eric Allan have scenes together that are so good, and painful, you find yourself afraid to breathe for fear they will step wrong. They never do. The movie is about Sylvia, a woman who works in an office and comes home at night to care for her sister, who is 29 years old and mentally retarded. Sylvia is a beautiful woman in an austere, grey-eyed, level and quiet way. She projects intelligence and a cynical amusement about her life and fate; Leigh is good at painting his characters with short, perfectly-sculpted scenes, and we feel we know Sylvia after a scene in which she sits in a mussy room, drinks cream sherry and pages through a book. She isn't an alcoholic; it's just that one might as well drink some sherry in the evening if one is going to feel bloody awful otherwise. Into Sylvia's life one week come two men. One is a teacher she knows slightly. He asks her out to dinner on a Saturday, and she accepts. The other is a painfully inarticulate hippie, totally awash in his own feelings of self-worthlessness, who comes to run the mimeograph machine after Sylvia's garage is rented by an underground magazine. Sylvia is the kind of woman, we sense, who has deep wells of humor, of intelligence, of generous and demanding erotic needs. She is not a spinster; she is a captive. The teacher, Peter (played by Eric Allan) has needs too, and they are as desperate as he is incapable of fulfilling them. In a situation of authority, he can cope through habit and an acquired manner; at Sylvia's house, he puts down the hippie by treating him as the failed schoolboy he (in fact) happens to be. But Peter cannot cope with women, or anything else that offers a challenge. He clearly feels Sylvia is above him, and he is paralyzed by shyness when he is around her. He can hardly speak. He phrases his words so painfully and doubles back so often in his sentences that what comes out is a kind of apologetic gibberish. And what is Sylvia to do? As played by Anne Raitt, she is a person who has come to contain her passions within a reserved manner. On their dinner date, they have a painful and (for Peter) humiliating experience with a rude Chinese waiter. This scene, like many in the film, has a great deal of buried humor: We want to cry, and laugh. Then they go back to her apartment, and sit, and sit, and Sylvia drinks sherry and tries to tempt Peter to unwind a little. He never quite does. This scene in Sylvia's living room, which runs for quite a long time, is the best thing in its line since the celebrated bedroom scene in "My Night at Maud's." Sylvia clearly wants Peter do something, but he cannot. God, does he want to! She sits on her couch and subtly uses her body and her face and voice to try to lure him across the room by erotic magnetism, but he will not respond. The scene is one of the sexiest I can remember; sometimes the repression of passion is more erotic that its immediate fulfillment. What's going on in that room between those two people is as charged with desire--and the anger that frustrated desire can turn into--as anything in the labyrinthine sexual evasion of characters by Henry James. And then there is a moment: Peter has finally taken a sip from his glass, and Sylvia crosses the room to refill it. But he wants no more. No matter; she fills it to the very brim, and looks down at him. "Well, what are you going to do about it?" she says (for now he will have to drink it or spill it). "Hold it as steadily as I can," he says. The buried mutual aggression in this scene is as violent in its way as the farthest reaches of Peckinpah. Anne Raitt's performance is one of the best I have ever seen. Her role is so tremendously difficult. She has got to let us know everything about her without ever once losing control. Her surface remains unbroken; her manner is most often impassive, or conventionally polite or kind. But we are somehow inside her mind, understanding how she feels about her sister, her friends, her fate. Sylvia's magnificent personality is trapped inside that desperate life, and Anne Raitt achieves one of the most difficult things an actress can do in convincing us of that fact without ever seeming to try to. This film is a masterpiece, plain and simple, and that is a statement I doubt I will ever have cause to revise. ... Read more

Reviews (10)

CLASSIC SLICE OF MIDDLE-CLASS BRITISH LIFE.
Director/writer Mike Leigh's working methods are, by now, legendary. He customarily gathers his hand-chosen cast well before filming begins to flesh out characters on their own based on his outline of events and then encourages improvisation to allow the performer to inhabit the character, rather than a stock, lifeless portrayal. The actors aren't the only ones to benefit from this theatre-like approach to filmmaking; Leigh's core audiences eagerly await each entry to his already estimable canon with great anticipation. While SECRETS AND LIES is more dramatic and TOPSY TURVY more cinematic, for me LIFE IS SWEET is the most memorable of his films. Perhaps its the sweet, world-weary musical score from the wonderful Rachel Portman. Or the concentration on just a few days in the lives of a working-class British family and their small circle of friends. Not to mention the miraculous performances of Jane Horrocks as the anguished Nicola--half of a twin sister set (the sublimely droll Claire Skinner is her offset) and the triumphant, life-affirming work of Alison Steadman (Leigh's real-life spouse) as Wendy, the earth-mother with seemingly limitless patience. Since this film, Jim Broadbent, Timothy Spall, David Thewlis, and Stephen Rea have gone on to great successes in films like ENCHANTED APRIL, THE CRYING GAME, NAKED, SHOOTING THE PAST, BULLETS OVER BROADWAY, and TOPSY-TURVY, establishing themselves as invaluable players in modern cinema, whether in lead or supporting roles.

LIFE IS SWEET may seem to not "go anywhere" in modern terms, but look closely and the delightful, profoundly moving rewards will suprise you and no doubt lead to repeated viewings, even if just to enjoy Ms Steadman's infectious laugh. A must see for fans of British comedy and drama.

Vintage Leigh
Although I always enjoyed his films, I never fully appreciated Mike Leigh until I heard his commentary on All or Nothing. Since then, I think I have been able to see Leigh for what he is: An incredibly gifted storyteller. I no longer feel the need to search his movies for some overblown message or statement, but rather just allow myself to enter into the lives of the intriguing characters he presents to us, walk with them on their journey, and learn with them as they learn about themselves.

Life is Sweet is generally lighter fare than, say, his much later Secrets and Lies or All or Nothing, but it is no less compelling. The main characters are well-sketched, their humorous idiosyncracies never quite overstepping the mark into caricature (apart from some of the supporting characters, perhaps), and given enough depth and complexity to avoid the impression that Leigh is patronizing towards them (in a way that a lesser storyteller, such as Willy Russell, often appears).

Life is Sweet is very funny, very warm, but also very human and poignant, with a few moments of grittiness. The ensemble of actors, including Jim Broadbent, Alison Steadman and (a very young) Timothy Spall deliver superb performances. Rachel Portman's score veers between the playful and the melancholy, reflecting (creating?) the tone of the film.

A top 10 classic....
In the early '90s when LIFE IS SWEET was released, the film made the top 10 lists of film critics everywhere, including Siskel and Ebert, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, and the San Francisco Chronicle. So why hasn't this film made it to DVD??

LIFE IS SWEET is the story of a set of twin teenage girls played by Claire Skinner and Jane Horrocks. You'll recognize Claire and Jane if you're a BBC/PBS fan. Claire played a chef-in-training on 'Chef' and a lady cop on 'Second Sight'. Jane Horrocks is LITTLE VOICE and I believe she played 'Bubbles' in 'Absolutely Fabulous'. Alison Steadman plays the mother in LIFE IS SWEET and she played Mrs. Bennett in 'Pride and Prejudice' (the most recent version with Colin Firth).

Claire and Jane play their parts so well it is hard to believe they aren't real identical twins--even though they play very different characters. The first time I saw this film I thought the same girl was playing both roles (as did Hayey Mills in the 'Parent Trap'). The supporting cast includes many familiar faces including Jim Broadbent, whom I first noticed in 'Widow's Peake' though he also starred in the Gilbert and Sullivan film Mike Leigh produced a few years ago.

LIFE IS SWEET is a story of teenage angst in an English working class family. One of the twins, Nicola (played by Jane Horrocks), has a problem with food. She starves herself when others are around and then gorges and purges in private (anorexia nervosa?). When Nicola and her boyfriend have sex she insists they do it with chocolate. Nicola dreams of taking her life beyond the narrow working-class world she inhabits. The other twin, played by Claire Skinner works as a plumber. She appears to be a practical and level-headed youngster, the kind most desired in traditional homes.

Mike Leigh's best films, including LIFE IS SWEET, are stories about working-class youngsters coming of age (SECRETS AND LIES, CAREER GIRLS, MEANTIME). These tales involve the arrival of the protagonist at a new level of awareness and personal resolution following a period of less than enthusiastic participation in a "hostile" world. In the end, Nicola finds her place in the world she inhabits and that life is sweet.

Recommended
Unlike with novelists or musicians, I don't often follow the work of particular directors. But Mike Leigh is an exception. His ability to bring out the best in actors--or his willingness to let them alone to do their best--and then form all the performances into a cohesive movie seems amazing to me. But he not only has confidence in his actors; he has confidence in his audience as well. What results are movies on a human scale, intelligent and revealing.
"Life Is Sweet," like "Secrets and Lies," is one of Leigh's more commercial efforts (as opposed to, say, "Naked"). But "Life" is much lighter and funnier. In this story, there are also family secrets, and difficulties and disappointments, but it never strays far from its title argument: that after all, life IS sweet.
Jim Broadbent (Moulin Rouge, Topsy-Turvy) and Alison Steadman (Pride and Prejudice, Abigail's Party, and Leigh's real-life wife) play Andy and Wendy, a middle-class suburban English couple. They're loving and hardworking parents, but still young enough themselves to dissolve into laughing fits on the sofa or tease each other to their horror of their daughters.
Andy produces his own minor crisis when his self-employment ambitions take the form of a ratty refreshments van, sold to him by a hilariously untrustworthy Stephen Rea. At the same time, Wendy takes on yet another part-time job when she offers to waitress at a friend's new restaurant--an episode so filled with Timothy Spall's manic efforts that it really defies words.
But the real story in "Life Is Sweet" centers around Andy and Wendy's twin daughters, in their early twenties. Natalie, played by Claire Skinner (Almost Strangers, Naked) is the calm, dry center of the family storm. It's a tribute to Skinner that Natalie remains so likeable and watchable throughout the movie, given that she rarely changes expression or inflection. But within the family dynamics, her character is absolutely understandable.
Not so much the calm center is Nicola, the other twin. Jane Horrocks (Little Voice, Absolutely Fabulous) turns in another astonishing performance as a young woman paralyzed by her own myriad and mostly nameless fears. You desparately want Nicola to reach out for help, even at the same time you find her infuriating or hilarious.
Bolstering the leads are David Thewlis, as Nicola's bizarre daytime visitor, and, as mentioned before, Timothy Spall and Stephen Rea. To measure Spall's versatility, compare his performance here with "Secrets and Lies." And Rea is always great; here he manages to be both slightly menacing and completely hapless.
With this kind of acting, and Leigh's deft hand with loving slices-of-life, there's very little to dislike about this movie.

Like spring water!
I find his movies so refreshing. The scene I remember best, oddly, is the one where the mother and her daughters bring out the patio umbrella and four cushions for the plastic chairs, unstack the chairs, set up the umbrella, then squint in the bright sun while the umbrella casts a shadow on the wall. No mainstream film would ever "waste" footage on something so unentertaining. But it is so universal that you just know you can trust the truths elsewhare in this movie. I think it's too narrow to think of Leigh's films as "about the British working class". ... Read more

Album Description

Asian only All Code / NTSC DVD. 1996 British film directed by the amazing Mike Leigh (Naked, Career Girls) & starring Timothy Spall, Phyllis Logan & Brenda Blethyn. Leonard Maltin said, 'Another of filmmaker Leigh's compelling portraits of ordinary people ... Read more

Reviews (49)

Powerful emotional experience
This film is possibly the most emotionally powerful film I have ever seen. I have never cared more for a group of characters as I did for those in "Secrets and Lies." Director/writer Mike Leigh is famous for giving his actors the outlines of their characters and having them improvise most of their lines. This technique succeeds brilliantly here - you feel as if you're a part of these people's lives. All the actors turn in wonderful performances - Brenda Blethyn as the long-suffering poor single English mother, Marianne Jean Baptiste as a young black girl in search of her natural parents, Claire Rushbrook as Blethyn's rebellious daughter, and Phyllis Logan as Blethyn's well-to-do yet frustrated sister in law. At the center of it all is a monumentally understated performance by Timothy Spall, who as Blethyn's brother attempts to hold everyone's lives together as they face the pain of their ordinary existence. A truly moving film that is one of the best ever.

A triumph
A mild-mannered, intelligent young black woman (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) tracks down her birth mother, Cynthia Purley (Brenda Blethyn), who just happens to be white. That's only the central plot thread in Mike Leigh's very poignant, very funny, very smart family drama, which received well-deserved Oscar nominations for best picture, best director, best actress, best supporting actress, and best original screenplay. A keenly observed piece set in middle-class and upper middle-class England, "Secrets & Lies" offers such an abundance of riches it's hard to know where to begin.

The plot is fairly simple, though the emotions beneath it aren't. Cynthia is initially afraid to meet the child she gave up years ago, but eventually opens up and discovers that her long-lost daughter, Hortense, is not only a sweet and refined young lady, but the possible source of the love and affection she wants so badly. She receives none of that sort of attention from her other daughter, Roxanne, a bitter, sharp-tongued council worker who, like her secret half-sister, was conceived out of wedlock. Adding to the tension is Cynthia's relationship with her brother, Maurice, and his socially ambitious wife, Monica. The latter is pained by her inability to have a child, and particularly despises Cynthia, who is able to bear children but, in Monica's mind, unable to provide them with the family environment and opportunities that she can. All of these threads converge at an afternoon birthday party, during which all the pent-up secrets and lies explode like a sequence of fireworks. Emotions are laid bare, the past is revealed, and finally, the film hints, the healing process can begin.

A synopsis really doesn't do full justice to the sheer impact of this film. In fact, it's almost insulting--and irrelevant--to discuss plot at all. "Secrets & Lies" isn't about plot in the conventional sense; it's about people. Each character is a complex, fully realized human being, brought to life by superior acting. Brenda Blethyn in particular does a spectacular job, and her Cynthia emerges as one of the most hilarious, endearing, and noble human portraits I've ever seen captured on film. Marianne Jean-Baptiste has a less showy role, but she occupies it with equally genuine warmth and humility. The other performances are consistently excellent, with Timothy Spall (Maurice) and Phyllis Long (Monica), who play tortured but thoroughly sympathetic characters, among the standouts.

The actors are complimented by Leigh's superb direction. Each shot has clearly been carefully thought-out, but the camera is so unobtrusive, so casually observing, that it lends "Secrets & Lies" an almost documentary-like feel. And yet, Leigh's compassion for all his characters leaks through every frame. One of the best scenes in the film takes place in a teashop, with Cynthia and Hortense sharing a first meeting that moves from initial awkwardness to humor and hilarity, to intense sadness and finally to catharsis and relief. The scene is an unbroken, unedited single shot lasting for nearly eight minutes, and Blethyn and Jean-Baptiste sustain the dramatic tension for that long without missing a beat. It is a seamless culmination of acting, writing, and cinematography, and represents (I think) one of the most remarkable and honest shots ever committed to celluloid.

Therein lies the secret to the success of "Secrets & Lies"--every moment in the film feels real. That quality is aided by the fact that, as is the case in all of Leigh's other films, the screenplay is a collaboration between both writer/director and actors. The dialogue never sounds scripted or contrived because most of it has been improvised by the actors themselves; thus, it's no wonder that the characters all but leap off the screen, and that spending time with them is such an engaging and rewarding experience.

Some have criticized the film's overly "happy" ending, claiming that it feels a bit too pat to be real. I disagree. The conclusion, though admittedly more optimistic a resolution than most conflicted families can expect, remains utterly true to the characters' personalities and backgrounds. Actually, Leigh trumps the notion that all films attempting to illuminate the human condition must be overly bleak and pessimistic.

"Secrets & Lies" is not a fast-paced film, and at 152 minutes, it's quite long. It could have gone on for hours and hours as far as I was concerned. Mike Leigh has confirmed my long-held notion that American cinema could definitely learn a thing or two from the sure-and-steady British. Without a doubt, one of the best films, if not the best, of 1996.

touching and realistic and simply incredibly little gem
This is a little known but absolutely wonderful film that, corny as this sounds, deserves to be shared by many.A small film about a family and the small day to day trials and tribulations they go through.It's very realistic and deals with the the most average everyday things.What makes this film so amazing is how it is able to present this window into the lives of this group of people with such wit and insight, sadness and honesty; ultimately resulting in a film which is tender and uplifting and hopeful.

Tha acting is simply awesome. No other words to put it.Everyone from Brenda Blethyn to Timothy Spall to Marianna Jean Baptiste, to Claire Rushbrook, all take turns stealing scenes in performances that are so natural and on point that at times, it doesn't even feel like they're acting. This is true acting that cuts straight to the heart.The script is wonderful in that it provides so many little details that one wouldn't think to include in a movie. Just the smallest things which somehow bring the characters to life.

A wonderful film that is never going to get any acclaim because this is all about the actors.No special effects or halle berry sex scenes. No way-this is an actor's film.And they steal the show.If you have taste in REAL cinema, do not miss this gem of a movie.IT IS SIMPLY WONDERFUL.

On How Life Is
This superbly acted and written drama is certainly one of the best british movies of the 90`s, dealing with human feelings and relationhips in an unique, realistic and powerful way. Like the best british movies out there, it wisely combines drama and comedy, creating a meaningful portrayal of life.

The story focuses a young black woman`s (Marianne Jean-Baptiste)quest to find her real mother who abandoned her as a child (Brenda Blethyn). Problem is, her mother`s life is currently a mess and that new element ends up generating some problems, conflicts and tensions in the family.

Mike Leigh`s direction offers time and room for his actors to develop the characters, creating three-dimensional individuals who seem real everyday people. The scenes are very well crafted, with close attention to detail and strong, credible dialogue. The performances are all terrific and natural, and the story flows well although the pace is a bit slow at times. It`s certainly one of the most interesting movies about family ties and the need of belonging somewhere, also focusing the differences and personality flaws that keep people away from each other.

At times sad and moving, in other moments cheerful and uplifting, "Secrets & Lies" presents the necessary but at times difficult experience of family reunion in a realistic way.
A worthwile, poignant drama with much to recommend.

One Lie I Wish Filmakers Would Stop Telling
I would be dishonest if I did not compliment Leigh and his cast on such beautifully acted roles interwoven in such a sweetly told story, but why on Earth do movie makers persist in using actors who so very obviously have two black parents to portray mixed race people? Jean-Baptiste's Hortense is superbly explored and bought to life, but as a parent of mixed race children I found it difficult to suspend disbelief in being asked to accept that she had a white mother (a sentiment echoed by many in the mixed race community). A trivial criticism most of you will cry, but this type of miscasting does a disservice to reality and serves only to propagate hypodescent myths regarding mixed race people. ... Read more