Which Side Are You On?

Making groundbreaking dramas for the BBC's 'Wednesday Play' series in the 1960s, Ken Loach was one of the first to show life as it was really lived. With the film Kes, the director established an international reputation. After falling on hard times in the 1980s, he then made a feature-film revival that was little short of remarkable, with masterpieces such as Land and Freedom, Carla's Song and Sweet Sixteen. Anthony Hayward's book shows how Loach's films have made folk heroes of both actors and their characters: Ricky Tomlinson taking his experiences of the building trade and its scams to Riff-Raff; David Bradley as the schoolboy consigned to a life down the pit in Kes, and Peter Mullan drawing on memories of his father's alcoholism in My Name is Joe. It also reveals the influence on Loach of a father who was fanatical about education, the socialist politics that drive his work, and the long-running collaborations with writers and producers such as Jim Allen, Barry Hines, Tony Garnett and Rebecca O'Brien.