“The Last Tape”: Hope Maybe Not So Obscene

Towards the end The last tape (UK-France-Belgium, 2024), the 30th feature film from veteran English director Ken Loach (from his memorable debut) poor cowfrom 1967, to the main hard work Family ties2019, passing through such central pieces in British cinema as bag1969, Riff Raff1991 or Sweet sixteen(2002), sensitive sixty-something TJ Ballantyne (Dave Turner) encounters a lifelong friend who, out of mere resentment, helped sabotage an act of generosity organized by TJ himself at his run-down pub, The Old Oak, which has opened its old doors to a group of Syrian immigrants.

TJ is more disappointed than upset. He understands and shares the diagnosis: the mining town of Durham has already seen its best days, Thatcher’s policies ended it decades ago, there are no jobs anywhere, and the few young people who remain are barely growing up and leaving. But what is the fault of the Syrian immigrants who have just arrived in the town in all this? This place was already like this before that group of people who had lost everything except life, and perhaps hope, arrived in that place in the north of England. TJ’s complaint to his friend is simple: why is it that, when things go wrong, there are people who, instead of looking up, at the powerful, decide to look down, at the weakest, to make their lives even harder?

Of course, this is a rhetorical question that TJ doesn’t expect his former comrade to answer. It’s not a precise question either, and the answer is simple: many ordinary people, even among the most vulnerable, choose racism and xenophobia because it’s easier to channel resentment by corrupting those below than to organize to corrupt those above. TJ himself says it in his emotive/emotive language: it’s easier to resort to hatred, lies, corruption, and betrayal. And in the situation in Durham – across England, across the UK, and across the world – hope has become “obscene.”

This is a very harsh speech from Ken Loach, arguably the most progressive director in British cinema. Born in 1936 in a community very similar to Durham, the son of a skilled labourer in a proletarian family, Loach had a privileged education, coming to Oxford to study law, although he never practised it because he was so interested in it from the beginning. He entered the theatre, even becoming president of the experimental theatre club at his university. After his time in the air force, Loach chose a theatrical career. He acted and directed some productions in the English regional circuit until he was given the opportunity to work for the BBC, in some television series specialising in filmed theatre, such as Wednesday playWho directed dozens of episodes between 1965 and 1969, especially “Cathy Come Home” (1966), which was memorable not only for its appeal to audiences and critics, but for its explicitly militant subject matter – its condemnation of rampant unemployment and the working class’s lack of access to decent housing – which managed to get Parliament to publicly debate the situation and even propose laws to alleviate the problem.

Since his beginnings as a film director. poor cowproduced a year after Cathy Come Home, Loach’s extensive filmography – some thirty documentaries and feature films, not counting numerous television episodes and TV movies – has not moved an inch ideologically. His cinema is transparent in its moral stance on the social and economic injustices faced by the working classes in the UK, but always avoids falling into direct political pamphlets. Following the path charted by Italian neorealism and especially bike thieves (De Sica, 1947) – the film that most influenced his decision to devote himself to cinema – Loach likes to alternate professional actors with amateurs, and his scripts come from careful research, although he allows constant improvisation from his artists, and seeks to make each character they embody their own.

Nearly six decades after his directorial debut, Loach remains true to his radical political beliefs—more socialist than laborist—and his cooperative/community work ethic. The last tape It is the third part of a trilogy of films focusing on the difficult conditions of the working class in the north of England, following the multi-award-winning film. I’m Daniel Blake (2016) – Winner of the Palme d’Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival – The Painful Family ties (2019) – In Competition at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival and Winner of the Audience Award at San Sebastian 2019 –. As in these two films, in The last tape The characters are ordinary people who have seen all remnants of hope evaporate since the implementation of Thatcherite policies in the 1980s, which were inherited by the next British rulers, Conservatives or Labour.

TJ played retired firefighter Dave Turner in his first leading role – his only acting experience having been in small roles in I’m Daniel Blake And Family ties– He’s a single grown man who clings to continuing to tend his crumbling bar. old oak English title – Because he has nothing else to do, and because, moreover, he will not have the money to survive. He is hurt by the harm he did to his dead wife – which must have been serious, because his only son refuses to speak to him – and devotes his free time to helping the feisty activist Laura (Claire Rodgerson) in whatever capacity she can. So, when a group of Syrian refugees come to live in some houses in the poor Durham area, TJ is one of the few reasonable voices who not only refuses to distrust, discriminate or insult the newcomers, but instead tries to make their lives better until he ends up forming a close friendship with the young photographer Yara (Ebla Marie), who has arrived there with her mother and younger siblings, as her father is still missing.

The plot was written by Paul Laverty, Loach’s main screenwriter since then. Carla’s song (1996), shows us who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. In this sense, Loach and Lafferty do not want us to get confused: there are no possible nuances, for example, when it is the son of a former man – as the old men in the pub remember him – who directs hatred at the newly arrived refugees. There can be no justification for this meanness. But there are other characters who initially react with distrust or even outright rejection. In this ambiguous dramatic territory, Loach and Lafferty show us how it is possible to open our eyes, build bridges, and connect.

As is often the case with other great masters still in their 80s or non-generations still working—I think of Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen—at this stage of the game, Ken Loach does not seek to surprise anyone—though he ultimately succeeds, by the way. His very refined style shows the serenity of someone who knows what he wants to say and how to do it. Yorgos Lanthimos’ cameraman, Robbie Ryan, does not allow for any excesses of any kind: its precise nature presents us with an environment that feels real not only because the film was made in real locations, but also because the actors and the production of the film were shot in real places. The images convey conviction. They may represent a story, but they do not lie.

The rhythm of the montage, edited by Jonathan Morris, gives us time to reflect: sequences are broken up by fades to black and on several occasions the scene lasts a few seconds longer, as if Loach has decided to hold this shot longer than recommended. Why this rush? Where does the viewer want to go? Wouldn’t you like to close your eyes for a moment, breathe, and think about what makes us human and, even more so, what could make us better people?

In what may be his last film, Loach suggested that The last tape It could be his farewell to cinema – the indomitable British director and activist wanted to retire with a hopeful air. I won’t say how this film ends; I will only point out that the ending is, paradoxically, the most Hollywood ending of Ken Loach’s entire career. And, in the end, maybe hope isn’t so obscene.