Kes (film)

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Kes

DVD Cover for Kes
Directed by Ken Loach
Produced by Tony Garnett
Written by Barry Hines (novel)
Tony Garnett
Starring David Bradley
Freddie Fletcher
Lynne Perrie
Colin Welland
Brian Glover
Music by John Cameron
Cinematography Chris Menges
Editing by Roy Watts
Distributed by MGM
Release date(s) 1969
Running time 110 min
Language English
IMDb profile

Kes is a British film from 1969 by director Ken Loach and producer Tony Garnett. and focuses how the aspirations of the main character, Billy Casper, are raised by his relationship to falconry while being subdued and dashed by family and school. The film is based on the novel, A Kestrel for a Knave authored by Barry Hines in 1968.

[edit] Synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The film focuses on Billy Casper, who has little hope in life beyond becoming a coal miner and is bullied both at home, by his physically and verbally abusive brother, Jud, as well as at school. He is mischievous himself; he steals milk from milk floats, gets other students into trouble and generally fights and misbehaves. Billy comes over as an emotionally neglected boy with little self-respect. His mother refers to him in the film as a hopeless case.

Outside cadging money, smoking cigarettes and day-dreaming at school Billy has no positive interests. His greatest fear is ending up working down the pit as a coal miner but he has no apparent escape route from what would ultimately be his fate. That is until he finds an outlet from his pitiful existence through training a kestrel that he takes from a nest on a farm. His interest in learning falconry prompts Billy to take out his first Library Book (which he steals as he cannot get a borrower's card).

As the relationship between Billy and Kes, the kestrel, during the training improves so does Billy's outlook and horizons. For the first time in the film Billy receives praise, from his English teacher after delivering an impromptu talk on his relationship with the bird.

However, Billy purposefully neglects to place a bet on a horse for his brother, instead keeping the money for himself as Billy assumes it is unlikely to win. When the horse does win and Jud receives no winnings he "pays" Billy back by killing his kestrel. This point, near the end of the film, is the bleakest moment for Billy.

Spoilers end here.

[edit] Location and Cast

Both the film and the book provide an authentic portrait of life in the mining areas of Yorkshire of the time. The school used as the main set was St. Helens School, Carlton Road, Athersley South, Barnsley, but has since been renamed as the Edward Sheerien School. Set in Barnsley, the film contains broad local dialects. The cast have authentic northern accents and used or knew the dialects. Extras were all hired from in and around Barnsley. David Bradley, who played Billy Casper, was born in Barnsley and the main actors were born in parts of Yorkshire or neighbouring Lancashire.

[edit] Falconry

Some wildlife conservationists have waged campaigns against this film, saying that it encouraged children and teenagers who had not had training in falconry, to take kestrels from the wild to try to tame them. There is a strong concentration on falconry in the film but the film does not encourage any illegal behaviour with respect to falcons[verification needed].

[edit] Literature

Golding, Simon W. (2006). Life After Kes: The Making of the British Film Classic, the People, the Story and Its Legacy. Shropshire, UK: GET Publishing. ISBN 0-9548793-3-3. 

[edit] External links

Ken Loach
1960s Poor Cow | Kes
1970s The Save the Children Fund Film | Family Life | Black Jack
1980s The Gamekeeper | Looks and Smiles | Which Side Are You On?
1990s Fatherland | Hidden Agenda | Riff-Raff | Raining Stones | Ladybird Ladybird | Land and Freedom | A Contemporary Case for Common Ownership | Carla's Song | The Flickening Flame | My Name Is Joe
2000s Bread and Roses | The Navigators | Sweet Sixteen | Ae Fond Kiss... | Tickets | The Wind That Shakes the Barley
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