King of the Grit

A patron of British cinema, Mike Leigh brings fame, fortune and recognition to the British film industry. With a world renowned, unique, exceptionally enthralling way of bringing his pictures to life, he’s gained many accolades through his illustrious career; including 6 Oscar nominations, 2 BAFTA wins, to sit alongside countless nominations, and a Palme d’Or.

Starting simply with a basic premise, Leigh meets his actors individually, discusses with them his basic ideas and slowly, over a period of weeks allows his stars to develop their characters. Introducing them to each other in the order they would meet in the movie and revealing their fates only once they already have established feelings and motives in the context of their current situations, enables him to impress a realism on his pictures unheard of in Hollywood. This truly ingenious technique has given us some of the most moving performances of the last two decades and given a plateau to the likes of David Thewlis and Brenda Blethyn to demonstrate to the world the very best of their talent.

Born and growing up in Salford, Lancashire, Leigh was brought up in a Jewish immigrant family in a heavily working class area. Winning a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1960, Leigh starred in minor roles in British cinema and TV during the early 60’s, before turning to writing and directing his own material. He began writing television plays in the 70’s, which were heavily influenced by his working class upbringing and were often bleak, satirising of the middle classes. His gritty, ‘kitchen sink realism’ is best personified in Nuts in May, Abigail’s Party and Ecstasy. Like most socialist leaning, working class writers of the 1970’s and 1980’s, his works were critical social commentaries on Thatcher’s Britain, with their stark confrontation of tough issues.

His first mainstream, critically acclaimed feature length movie, High Hopes, is a politically motivated insight into the difficulties of being a socialist, which garnered him the Venice Film Festival award. This was followed by the Nationally Society of Film Critics award for the comical Life Is Sweet. While these previous two works, though with deep undertones and hard hitting questions, were comical in nature, Leigh’s next showpiece for the world was anything but. The 1993 movie Naked is arguably one of the greatest British movies ever made, its bleak, shocking look at the undesirable London night scene made him, along with his star David Thewlis, the darlings of Cannes and redefined a generation of British cinema. While Naked solidified Leigh’s status as a household name here however, it was his next movie, the 1996 masterpiece, Secrets and Lies that propelled one of the best British directors onto the world stage. With six academy award nominations, including best director, screenplay and actress in a leading role (for the mind blowing Brenda Belthyn), this is Leigh’s most successful picture to date. This has since been followed by Career Girls, Topsy Turvy, All or Nothing, Vera Drake and the 2008 hit All or Nothing. The latter two especially earning huge international acclaim and Oscar recognition.

Currently holding a 100 per cent rating on the internet website, RottenTomatoes, which represents the views of world renowned film critics; it’s no surprise Leigh’s considered one of the greatest British directors to have ever lived. Comparable to Hitchcock for his individual style and ability to get inside the mind of his audience and evoke emotions so many others could only dream of.