Review: The Old Oak

Image courtesy of Zeitgeist Films.

If "The Old Oak" is truly director Ken Loach's final film, then it is a fitting farewell. The director, who with Mike Leigh has produced some of the best-known kitchen sink British dramas of the past seven decades, has long been interested in working class tales and his films put faces to the people who are affected by political and class struggles.

As his latest film opens, a family of Syrian refugees has been relocated to a small town in England following strife in their home country. The year is 2016, several years before Brexit but at the same time that Donald Trump was leading his successful and racist presidential campaign across the pond. 

The Syrian family is harassed by the predominately white denizens of the neighborhood into which they are moving, aside from TJ Ballantyne (Dave Turner) and Laura (Clare Rodgerson), the owner of a rundown but popular drinking hole and the head of a local charity group, respectfully. TJ steps in as Yara (Ebla Mari) is tormented by a man who ends up breaking her camera.

As it turns out, Yara was given the camera by her father, who is the only family member not in England. He is believed to be dead, a victim of the horrific Assad regime. Naturally, Yara, who loves to take photos, is devastated that this cherished gift from her father has been damaged. TJ, a good soul who lives alone with his pup Marra after his wife divorced him and son no longer speaks to him, offers to help Yara to get her camera fixed.

In short order, Yara and her family have befriended TJ and Laura, much to the chagrin of the anti-immigrant locals who frequent The Old Oak and believe that foreigners are taking over their neighborhood. Some of the residents eventually warm to Yara and her family - although her teenage son is mercilessly bullied by a group of bigoted young Brits - but there's a central group of four men who spend a lot of time in the bar that makes it clear to TJ that they plan to cause trouble.

It becomes a source of contention after this group of men asks TJ if they can use the bar's no-longer-utilized back room for a meeting to denounce immigrants moving into the neighborhood - although they swear they are not racist - and instead TJ is inspired when Yara sees a picture in The Old Oak's back room with an inscription from TJ's mother that says that those who eat together will stick together. 

He recalls during a miner's strike how the community stuck together and ensured no one went hungry. Yara comes up with an idea to do the same not only for the area's burgeoning immigrant community, but also its struggling English residents.

"The Old Oak" feels like a typical Loach picture - it's often devastating, it focuses on the everyday lives of the lower British working class, it's angry, and it doesn't shy away from politics. But there's a gentle sadness at the heart of this film that made it especially poignant - for example, there's a scene during which TJ explains to Yara why he's alone, how he almost made a terrible mistake some years before, and how his dog, Marra, saved his life. This is made all the more poignant later in the film after a tragedy occurs.

Loach has made a number of great movies that chronicle the struggles and lives of British working people, namely the 1969 classic "Kes," but also the Palm d'Or winners "The Wind That Shakes the Barley" and "I, Daniel Blake" as well as "Poor Cow" and "Hidden Agenda," among others. "The Old Oak" is a lovely and fitting way to round out a great filmography. It's a powerful look at how different groups of societal outcasts can come together and form a community at a time when persecution against those who are different is on the rise in what seems like nearly every society around the globe. This is a very good movie.