I don't think Mia felt any sense of victimhood.

It reminded me of Kez.

Same.

I thought this reveiw summed it up well:

http://movies.nytimes.com/2010/01/15/movies/15fish.html

I'm working in Tilbury at the moment, where the film was set, and where Katie Jarvis was scouted- arguing with her boyfriend at the train station. It's an unbearably grim place- the young people we are working with all loved the film and saw as it as a) proof that you could escape if you had some sass, or luck, and b) a kind of vindication of their lives, a way of getting it out there. Not that this makes the film good or bad, since that's an entirely objective thing. I watched Fish Tank purely because the choreographer on the movie is the one I'm working with- her dad came off a boat at Tilbury so she has that perspective also- and because a lot of the kids said 'you should watch it, it's about how shit this place is'. But they also felt a kind of pride and an identification with Mia and how she rises above it. I do think the mother was under developed- there's not really a shred of anything likeable or salvageable about her character. I guess you have to read her as in a long line of hopeless families. But the girl stayed in my mind for a long time afterwards.

The girl still stays in my mind to.

Z

Kes was so much a better film - in my view.

z

I agree, Kes was a masterpiece, probably one of the best British films of all time.

I think the mother's character does show a glimmer of hope, in the dance sequence at the end. Just a glimmer, yes, but it's there.

Thinking about it - perhaps Cathy Come Home is a better parallel with FT. There passion about injustice was given artistic expression that aroused passion in others to do something about it. And it changed attitudes - maybe the hardest task of all.



Z

Thinking about it - perhaps Cathy Come Home is a better parallel with FT. There passion about injustice was given artistic expression that aroused passion in others to do something about it. And it changed attitudes - maybe the hardest task of all.

It's a different world now though isn't it? The social ills that Loach got enraged about forty odd years ago are now firmly entrenched in society and, sadly, utterly normalised. Nobody's outraged or surprised anymore. Or at least it doesn't seem so.

We live in a world where police, politicians and newspapers are openly corrupt. With that sort of example being set by the people at the top, a fifteen year old girl sticking the nut on one of her peers, calling her little sister a cunt and shagging her Mam's new bloke seems utterly in keeping with the times.

I watched FT again the other night. There's a lot about it that can easily be criticised, not least the fact that you can see what's coming a mile off. But the inevitability of Mia's situation is successfully worked into the overall tone of the thing, I feel, and doesn't detract.

Ref this debate:

Check out Lee Hall on BBC R4 Today this morning (Tuesday 11.10.11) in discussion about new film Tyrannosaur. He mentions Fish Tank - same debate, same argument.

Z

If you want to see a film with a working class setting which avoids all the criticisms I have levelled against Fish Tank then I would highly recommend the newly released Tyrannosaurus.

Z