The Spirit of '45 (2013) Reviews

• Another society?

  stensson2013-10-06

  Why did Churchill lose the elections of 1945. Were people simply ungrateful? According to Ken Loach, there were two main reasons. People remembered the misery after WW1 and they had realized that if the state was able to organize the war victory, it should also be able to win victory in peace. So it came during Clement Attlee; nationalization of health care, of electricity, of the railways, of the coal mines. And at the same time Britain changed into a welfare state. It's a very effective documentary, but two questions remain unanswered. How was it all financed and why did Churchill come back in 1951? Anyway, it's refreshing to watch how politics once was in charge.

• May be seen by some as a bit one sided and self indulgent, but still admirably done

  davideo-22013-04-06

  STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning Ken Loach has quite a backlog of work as a performance film maker, but his latest work, laying his unashamed socialist leanings firmly on the line, is presented in a documentary format. Loach thrusts us back in time to the immediate post war years, where with a country in ruins and millions sick and injured, there was no shortage of work and so the people had the power, coming together to re-build the country and form one huge powerful united front that let them decide their own fate, all under the thrust of a powerful Labour movement. The real main objective of the movement was not to go back to the appalling poverty of before the war, which nobody noticed and was just accepted by those who lived in it. Flash forward twenty five years or so, to the arrival of Thatcher. The main trouble, when politics is presented as art, is that you are naturally going to spur on and impress those who agree with you and form the most spiteful critics out of those who think you don't know what you're talking about. Like the most high horsed (but probably best) Michael Moore offering, Ken Loach here bombards us with a presentation of faces, talking heads, if you will, of a mostly much older generation who vividly bring the original socialist movement back to life, and try to paint a portrait of the sort of things that originally spurned it on. Reminding me of Moore's work a little, as it does, it's all naturally quite one sided and could even be seen as somewhat self indulgent/important, but where Loach gets it right is by managing to make the film's argument so persuasive anyway, genuinely managing to craft a scene where the poor/lower classes generally had no voice and by realizing their combined power, improved things for themselves and their families, only to have it all snatched back from them many years later. It never feels pretentious in any way. It's just the work of a proud and accomplished director, maybe wearing his heart on his sleeve a little, maybe not being as subtle as he could be, but presenting something made with such insight and, well, spirit you can't help but be impressed anyway. *****

• A class in social policy

  cinematic_aficionado2013-03-18

  In his varied and multi angled study Ken Loach takes us on a journey back in time laying bare the most fair and socially way of running a country. Despite the devastation caused by the 6 year World War II, Britain looked back and realised that in the pre-War era although it had the biggest ever empire, the levels of poverty and deprivation were embarrassing. So, following the end of the War, the country followed ultra socialist policies that improved the quality of life for everyone very dramatically following which the documentary follows the changes in attitudes towards social friendly policies and how they impacted the population indicating how the drive towards ever higher profits is eroding the social fabric of this nation. A contemplating feast and a nostalgic journey.

• As to be expected extremely one-sided but well crafted.

  csrothwec2013-07-02

  An excellent film in terms of explaining both what the title says, "The Spirit of 1945" leading to the massive victory of the Labour Party in the UK general election of that year and also the roots of that victory. Loach (correctly) goes back to the end of the First World War and how the promises of "A Land fit for Heroes" was betrayed and millions of working men and their families instead spent most of the inter-war years (not just the so-called "Hungry Thirties") living in poverty and destitution. Their children were determined to build a better Britain and, as Loach shows, this feeling was also shared by many people from much wealthier backgrounds as well (in which bodies during the war such as the Army Bureau of Contemporary Affairs also played a significant role). Loach does not shy away from showing the weaknesses of the Labour Government's policies (e.g. very much "top down" and with no trace of the kind of Mitbestimmung which helped to rebuild West German industry in the same period), but he nevertheless paints far too positive a picture of what Attlee's governments actually achieved. By going straight from this period (1945-51) to the arrival of "the Wicked Witch" (Thatcher) in Downing Street in 1979, he is able to skate right over how much the Labour Government had NOT accomplished and just how rotten much of British industry and society was by the early-/mid-1970s (and which provided the environment in which Thatcher could only have come to power.) The short-sightedness of union leaders, for example, in focusing purely and simply on short-term economic gain for their members and rejecting totally Castle's "In Place of Strife" proposlas plus "holding the public to ransom" on unlimited occasions in the 1960s and 1970s is simply ignored as not fitting in with the polemic. In conclusion, watch this film to explain why the Labour election landslide happened, but if you want to know "what happened next", watch the 1959 comedy "I'm all right,Jack" as well. For every stalwart nurse and miner shown in Loach's film, there were unfortunately far too many "Fred Kites" leading their unions in the years after Attlee left office as well!

• A Shameless Polemic,but a good one

  BJJManchester2013-03-17

  Ken Loach's THE SPIRIT OF '45 is one of his occasional forays into documentary,and a timely and prescient one,recalling the immediate period just after World War II had ended,with Britain for the very first time electing a majority government for the Labour Party,led by Clement Attlee,on a genuinely radical,socialist agenda,embracing nationalisation of most heavy industry,a welfare state,Keynesian economics,widespread council house building and perhaps most notably,the founding of the NHS.The British people appreciated Winston Churchill's efforts at leading the nation and defeating the Nazis during the war,but felt Attlee was the man to lead them during the early years of peace afterwards. Loach has never been afraid to acknowledge his socialist leanings in public and on film,and this is a predictably affectionate,sometime sentimental tribute to the system he holds most dear,with interviews with various people from the era,housewives,miners,steelworkers,nurses among them and their experiences of pre-war poverty (some of them very moving),with more up to date opinions from dockers,academics and politicians.It is all relentlessly subjective,with no critical voices from other viewpoints in sight,and there are parts of the film which would've been helped by a more balanced outlook (it fails to acknowledge that the Conservatives broadly accepted these changes when they were in government in the next three decades),as Loach plunges the film into near,but not quite,hysterical tub-thumping,with any other political,social and economic opinions ignored or regarded as virtual evil. This is more than evident in the latter stages of the film;Loach shoots forward in time three full decades to when Margaret Thatcher became Conservative PM in 1979,as important an election as that of 1945.After the various crises of the 70's,such as the oil shock,stagflation and industrial unrest,her dismantling of the post-war consensus,returning to pre-war free market economics,accepted by the Labour Party when they got into power,is predictably savaged,referring to the mid-80's miner's strike,deregulated banks and markets,sale of council houses and industries and utilities privatised across the board. But now with the UK and much of the developed world in the worst recession since the war,mostly caused by the emphasis on free market economics and deregulated banks,perhaps a politically angry film like this should be seen,even if you don't necessarily agree with Loach's politics.Whatever you think of him,for or against,Loach is still a great filmmaker,and though some of the partisan views on show do sometimes become too excessive,it's good to see working class people,old,middle- aged and young,treated with more respect,dignity and compassion than has been the norm for around a decade or so on British film,TV and media in general,when crude if not offensive stereotyping and caricatures have mostly been the order of the day. THE SPIRIT OF '45 is the kind of film that will take no prisoners,and if you are the total opposite in politics to Ken Loach,fire will be spat at the screen.But there is never a dull moment,and Loach's appeal for a more inclusive,equal and less divisive society,all but evident here,may be increasingly prescient in the midst of grim,interminable austerity,as was suffered in the 30's Depression after the credit-leaden excesses of the Roaring 20's.There maybe another change in economic outlook soon in modern times,as there was with THE SPIRIT OF '45,which Loach quite obviously would like to revive again. RATING:7 out of 10.