Difficult to like this story about a woman who has been in abusive relationships in the past and has her children taken away from her.
I usually love Ken Loach film despite their bleak subject matter, which usually revolves around poverty and injustice in the various systems we are all part of.
However, unlike all other Loach films I've seen, where there are elements of comedy and sadness and hope along with interesting and endearing characters, Ladybird Ladybird was missing all of those redeeming qualities.
The central character, Maggie, was a horrid woman who had no self-control, constantly flies into fits of rage and has a foul vocabulary. She already has 3 kids by 3 different fathers (I think) by the time the story started. She comes across as the kind of mouthy individual you would rather not sit next to on a bus.
For no apparent reason, Jorge - an illegal alien – picks her up in the local pub and they begin a relationship. Soon he is declaring his love and they are having a child. The relationship did not make sense to me in the film as he is a nice and calm and considerate individual. She is an unattractive, aggressive, difficult woman. I did not understand what attracted him to her at all.
But anyway, she has another kid by yet another father. Due to her history and (falsified) complaints from a neighbour, the child is taken away by social services. So then they have another and this child is taken away also. Unfortunately a sore point for me was that the film did not explain why these two children got taken away. I know she had a history of violent relationships but she was not in one now and Social Services took the two kids away as soon as they were born. I didn't understand if this was purely because of past history (which would be a bit harsh really) or some other reason.
The film ends mid-story and on screen text reveals to us that this was a true story and that they went on to have a further 3 children, which they managed to keep. So she had 10 children in all, 7 of which were taken away by social services.
The film was too depressing and I could not sympathise with the characters at all.
I usually love Ken Loach film despite their bleak subject matter, which usually revolves around poverty and injustice in the various systems we are all part of.
However, unlike all other Loach films I've seen, where there are elements of comedy and sadness and hope along with interesting and endearing characters, Ladybird Ladybird was missing all of those redeeming qualities.
The central character, Maggie, was a horrid woman who had no self-control, constantly flies into fits of rage and has a foul vocabulary. She already has 3 kids by 3 different fathers (I think) by the time the story started. She comes across as the kind of mouthy individual you would rather not sit next to on a bus.
For no apparent reason, Jorge - an illegal alien – picks her up in the local pub and they begin a relationship. Soon he is declaring his love and they are having a child. The relationship did not make sense to me in the film as he is a nice and calm and considerate individual. She is an unattractive, aggressive, difficult woman. I did not understand what attracted him to her at all.
But anyway, she has another kid by yet another father. Due to her history and (falsified) complaints from a neighbour, the child is taken away by social services. So then they have another and this child is taken away also. Unfortunately a sore point for me was that the film did not explain why these two children got taken away. I know she had a history of violent relationships but she was not in one now and Social Services took the two kids away as soon as they were born. I didn't understand if this was purely because of past history (which would be a bit harsh really) or some other reason.
The film ends mid-story and on screen text reveals to us that this was a true story and that they went on to have a further 3 children, which they managed to keep. So she had 10 children in all, 7 of which were taken away by social services.
The film was too depressing and I could not sympathise with the characters at all.