REVIEW: Ken Loach Has Oppressive Fun with Soccer Pic Looking for Eric
What's remarkable about Looking for Eric is the number of ways in which it almost works. The script is by Loach's frequent collaborator Paul Laverty, and though the story takes a while to get cooking -- and though Cantona, a charming and vital presence, disappears from it for stretches that go on too long -- it does throw off a few inspired sparks. That's largely thanks to the actors -- particularly Evets. The actor and sometime musician (for a time, he was a bass player in the Fall) has Harry Dean Stanton-style hollowed-out eyes; he plays Eric's hunched-over hopelessness as a kind of recurring joke, but it's easy enough to warm to him. Eric has cocked up his life tremendously, but as Evets plays him, you can see that he's yearning to change, especially as he rounds the bend of late middle age. (Eric is a youngish grandfather, as we're reminded in a flashback scene showing his and Lily's courtship: They meet at a dance, circa 1979, as teenagers bonding over their love for '50s rock and roll.)
In fact, the problems that slow down Looking for Eric have nothing to do with the bare bones of the story or with the acting (which is, across the board, low-key and quite lovely). It's simply that Loach has a hard time shaping material into the concise, effective moments you need to make comedy sing. In Loachland, scenes meander, stretching on for yonks, until we forget what the point was supposed to be in the first place. For a director so in tune with the plight of the common people, Loach has always lacked the common touch. His movies often seem willfully un-pretty -- he shows the hardships of life by making our eyes work overtime, with little visual payoff. In the world of Loach, cracked plaster passes for scenery, and we should be grateful for that much, dammit -- there are poor little children in other social strata who don't even know what plaster looks like. Even in Looking for Eric, Loach can't resist punishing us, or at least admonishing us, just a little bit. He sends the hapless, innocent Eric into the lair of some nasty young thugs, who set their slavering, jaw-snapping dog loose on him. Nothing terrible happens, but it's an example of the way Loach so often feels compelled to sour the tone of his material, to remind us that human beings (and some dogs) really are just nasty, worthless scum at heart.
Still, Loach is trying to be jaunty here, and every once in a while his efforts pay off: The movie's finale, in which Eric's post-office pals band together to solve one of his thorniest problems, shows a rare, rousing joie de vivre. And there's always Cantona, a pleasingly bearlike, wine-drinking, regular-guy philosopher who shows up at irregular intervals to loosen up the proceedings. The film was actually the football star's idea. Cantona, who played his final game in 1997, now works as an actor in France, and he'd wanted someone to make a picture about his relationship with his fans. He and the film's French co-producers thought an English director would be best, and Loach was their first choice.
Loach is a big football fan himself, and that informs Cantona's scenes. They sparkle more than anything else in the film; you can almost sense Loach twinkling from the other side of the camera. It doesn't matter if you've never heard of Cantona (I hadn't). His presence boosts the charm quotient of Looking for Eric considerably. And forget the Virgin Mary: If he can get Loach to crack a smile now and then, he's nothing short of a miracle worker.
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Yellow card on the Loach bashing! Sure, it's easy to roll your eyes at Loach's unabashed politics - but from his first feature, Kes, through the much-underrated Los Angeles story about janitors organizing, Bread and Roses, Loach has always showed a genuine concern and fascination with the way real people live.
Like any filmmaker he has his missteps (I myself thought Wind That Shakes the Barley wasn't all that great - and Looking for Eric looks pretty slight). But at his best, Loach is still one of the foremost directors in the world, drawing excellent performances from his actors and displaying a strong visual style that is more workmanlike than flashy.
Two fairly recent standouts in his filmography: Sweet Sixteen and the lovely A Fond Kiss. For an example of Loach at his best, just watch the quiet, beautiful scene in the latter film, in which the young man Casim walks away from his sister's teacher's apartment and we see him in the space of a few minutes falling in love with her. Indelible, perfect.
Also, glad to see you continue to write Stephanie. I really loved your writing at Salon and am glad to know I can still read you here!
I actually just saw "Looking For Eric" at the IFC Center this past weekend and loved it! I disagree, I feel like Loach accurately portrays a side of British culture that hardly gets any attention. It is refreshing to see such a unique and new idea with a perfect balance of comedy and drama. After seeing this I can't wait to watch the next Ken Loach film.
I disagree with Stephanie. Ken Loach's films are absolutely wonderful to watch, and without doing so, one would completely dismiss the perfect blend of humor and drama that he so quietly embeds in his movies. I also just recently saw "Looking for Eric" and it was terrific. I can't wait for Loach's next movie. Not only is it appropriately opportune with the World Cup, but as a foreign film it truly takes you overseas because of the rich, cultural British ties portrayed. However, it is the fantastical and fanatical world of soccer, aloneness, and familial struggles that'll bring you back to reality (to America) as to how connected we really are microscopically. It is this balance of a simple town with grave situations that makes this film so refreshing: a true trademark of Loach's films. Not to mention how Eric Cantona's presence and role in the movie, brings alive a beautiful world of soccer where cultural loyalty is heartfelt. One of my favorite lines in the movie by Eric Cantona himself is, "Nobody forgets rock-and-roll." Once you watch Loach's films, you cannot forget them either.
I have to disagree with you Stephanie, "Looking for Eric" is a "comedy" that did "sing." Have you ever been stuck in a roundabout in your life? To me, "Looking for Eric" deserves an A+. The film conveys Eric's transformation from lost to found in a beautiful way. It serves to relay the larger message that we all may be lost in our lives at some point or another, but with a little imagination and an idol, we too can survive and live in a "fairytale"(Elizabeth Weitzman ,New York Daily News)
I'm from the States, and I didn't know who Cantona was until I saw the film (or Loach for that matter) but after seeing it I've come to appreciate them both. I thought it was a really engaging film. A lot of the drama is pulled from the universal source of regret, and much of the inspiration comes from how Eric chooses to face his own shortcomings head-on. Its those things that made this movie work on a comic level, because it's easy to relate to the characters. The acting was incredible, the whole cast deserves to hear it from much more influential sources than me. Anybody know if its showing State-side again soon?
Bravo Stephanie on calling out one of cinema's most overrated directors. People in the UK treat Loach the way some people treat Shakespeare comedies - as something they should appreciate, irrespective of whether the are genuinely entertained or moved. Ken's plangent dramas are always full of plucky working class and dastardly capitalists. A bit of nuance wouldn't go amiss amongst such crude steroetypes. And Paul Laverty is mystifing as a writer - his structures are shambolic, his characters unconvincing. And by the way, unless he's a master of irony he doesn't manage to acknowledge, let alone get past the fact, that the real Eric worked long and happily for soccer's biggest sporting capitalist machine, Manchester United.
Eric is not as bad as his painfully inept characterisation of the religious divide in West Coast Scotland in Ae Fond Kiss...but it's significant that very few of the people who Ken makes movies about, bother going to see Ken Loach movies. It's very much a chance for the middle class to pat themselves on the back for being so compassionate and liberal
good site!