Life is Sweet (1990)

Just about to watch Life is Sweet. According to my dad it's not one of Mike Leigh's best films, as the characters are a bit over-acted and stereotypical. However I'm going to give it a go-it's always good to have a balanced view of a director so you can have a justified opinion of them. I'm going to take some notes along the way too.
Pressing the play button.....now.

Jim Broadbent

Ah..the cast is coming up-Alison Steadman and Timothy Spall are on the agenda. I've only ever seen Alison Steadman in Gavin and Stacey so it will be interesting to see her in something different.
Oh I must have missed Jim Broadbent! Took me a while to recognise him, he looks so much younger.

Dinner scene in Life is Sweet

Dinner scene in All or Nothing

This dinner scene reminds me a lot of the dinner scene in All or Nothing, even the wallpaper is similar. Again Mike Leigh is portraying the bleak every-day life of the working family.

Stephen Rea in Life is Sweet/ The Butcher Boy

It's a coincidence that after watching The Butcher Boy Stephen Rea is playing 'Patsy' in Life is Sweet. He plays an alcoholic in both of them too! Also, in most of the Mike Leigh films I have watched so far, I have noticed that nearly all of the characters have appeared in the Harry Potter series.

I think that whilst watching more films I am definitely going to be able to recognize more actors so when I perhaps come to make films in the future I will have good references for my characters.

The wooden pillars in the pub frame the characters

I found Mike Leigh's framing technique really interesting. I like the way he uses elements of the environment to frame the shots. I think that it shows how the characters' environment reflects the lives of the people within them. It's almost like we become apart of our environments over time.

The door frame in this shot creates the frame. It creates a voyeuristic
effect.

Overall I really enjoyed this film! I disagree with my dad's opinion completely. Although some of the characters are comically over-acted, I think that this is a deliberate feature of the film and makes the film more entertaining, and I think that the comic elements were balanced equally with melancholic ones.