Vera Drake is a film where ordinary, hard-working families from mid-20th century England are charismatically recreated with astonishing attention to detail. The courting rituals, the black market, the nuclear family, the living conditions and the bonds between people who had lost loved ones in the war are captured with a feeling of authenticity. Imelda Staunton portrays eponymous loving wife and mother who has a very dark secret. I found myself so pulled in by her performance that, for most of the film, I was unaware of 'acting' - only the remarkable woman that is the film's centrepiece. Going to see Vera Drake is one of those experiences that leaves you shaken and profoundly concerned.
(spoilers follow on the theme of the movie and its moral tone, but most viewers will be aware of this before they see it)
Director Mike Leigh has pulled off a remarkable coup in choreographing his characters so that their surprise seems utterly genuine when the revelations about Vera's private life start to unfold. A hard-working cleaning lady by day, a devoted wife and mother the rest of the time (and Vera even looks after her sick mother on top of her other duties), this paragon of working class excellence is also an unpaid abortionist for a little while at five o'clock on a Friday - or occasionally at other times. Her friendly matter-of-fact approach to 'helping young women' is disarming, both in her bedside manner and in almost drawing us in to accepting that something is happening without having to know the details. But know we do, right down to the suction pump and cheese-grater for carbolic soap that are her stock-in-trade.
Yet the shock value is still largely from what is unexpressed or unseen, whether it is the ablutions Vera performs on folk, or the first stages of an over amorous advance that we are all too horribly aware will end in date rape. This is a film that is driven by superb acting, meticulous set recreation and a very believable script. It would have been easy to do the same story relying on hack sensationalism, but Leigh's approach is more that of the artist near the height of power.
The history and legislation on abortion developed in Britain in an almost unique way, largely as successive measures in harm-reduction, and is maybe worth mentioning to clarify the backdrop in which the film is set. Until the Abortion Act of 1967, the law of Offences Against the Person Act was rigorously applied and criminalised any abortion or attempted abortion - even, say, prosecuting a 13-year old girl who attempted to induce an abortion on herself by taking laxatives and sitting in a hot bath. The only way out was a defence by a doctor that he acted to save the life or health of the mother. In the film, this is demonstrated by an upper class girl who is granted an abortion at a cost of 100 guineas (reduced from 150 pounds). The financial pressure this created is put in context when we are told that a television, considered an unattainable luxury by Vera's family, cost 36 quid, or that the 2 guineas charged by Vera's middle-man was a vast sum for poorer women. The Abortion Act of 1967 (16 years after Vera's crime) allowed an abortion to be performed under certain conditions and was introduced to bring uniformity to the law, to clarify the law for doctors, and to stem the misery and deaths resulting from unhygienic, risky, and illegal abortions. Before 1967, thousands of women were victims of botched abortions. The legislation, rather than taking sides on the moral issues, simply tried to make a terrible situation less terrible. Perhaps it is for this reason that although abortion has always been controversial in Britain, it has not attracted the sometimes violent confrontation that has characterised the debate in the USA.
Remarkably, Leigh's film doesn't appear to take sides either. It's the heartfelt differences of opinion in the characters when everything comes to light that make us more aware of how genuine the different views on the subject really are. Even Vera's sister in law, portrayed through most of the film as quite a heartless character I felt, was seen as more sympathetic when we realise she simply wanted a Christmas at home with her husband, and nothing to do with the law-breaking Vera. Britain's Pro-Life Alliance Party, in a press release, gave the film a cautious welcome, though some people have branded the character an 'abortion loving witch' simply because Vera wins us over as is a nice person before we find out her secret. Most people, I think, will find the film very intellectually stimulating though, and feel that a wide range of views and situations were incorporated into this brave piece of cinema that successfully portrays a pivotal epoch in British history.
(spoilers follow on the theme of the movie and its moral tone, but most viewers will be aware of this before they see it)
Director Mike Leigh has pulled off a remarkable coup in choreographing his characters so that their surprise seems utterly genuine when the revelations about Vera's private life start to unfold. A hard-working cleaning lady by day, a devoted wife and mother the rest of the time (and Vera even looks after her sick mother on top of her other duties), this paragon of working class excellence is also an unpaid abortionist for a little while at five o'clock on a Friday - or occasionally at other times. Her friendly matter-of-fact approach to 'helping young women' is disarming, both in her bedside manner and in almost drawing us in to accepting that something is happening without having to know the details. But know we do, right down to the suction pump and cheese-grater for carbolic soap that are her stock-in-trade.
Yet the shock value is still largely from what is unexpressed or unseen, whether it is the ablutions Vera performs on folk, or the first stages of an over amorous advance that we are all too horribly aware will end in date rape. This is a film that is driven by superb acting, meticulous set recreation and a very believable script. It would have been easy to do the same story relying on hack sensationalism, but Leigh's approach is more that of the artist near the height of power.
The history and legislation on abortion developed in Britain in an almost unique way, largely as successive measures in harm-reduction, and is maybe worth mentioning to clarify the backdrop in which the film is set. Until the Abortion Act of 1967, the law of Offences Against the Person Act was rigorously applied and criminalised any abortion or attempted abortion - even, say, prosecuting a 13-year old girl who attempted to induce an abortion on herself by taking laxatives and sitting in a hot bath. The only way out was a defence by a doctor that he acted to save the life or health of the mother. In the film, this is demonstrated by an upper class girl who is granted an abortion at a cost of 100 guineas (reduced from 150 pounds). The financial pressure this created is put in context when we are told that a television, considered an unattainable luxury by Vera's family, cost 36 quid, or that the 2 guineas charged by Vera's middle-man was a vast sum for poorer women. The Abortion Act of 1967 (16 years after Vera's crime) allowed an abortion to be performed under certain conditions and was introduced to bring uniformity to the law, to clarify the law for doctors, and to stem the misery and deaths resulting from unhygienic, risky, and illegal abortions. Before 1967, thousands of women were victims of botched abortions. The legislation, rather than taking sides on the moral issues, simply tried to make a terrible situation less terrible. Perhaps it is for this reason that although abortion has always been controversial in Britain, it has not attracted the sometimes violent confrontation that has characterised the debate in the USA.
Remarkably, Leigh's film doesn't appear to take sides either. It's the heartfelt differences of opinion in the characters when everything comes to light that make us more aware of how genuine the different views on the subject really are. Even Vera's sister in law, portrayed through most of the film as quite a heartless character I felt, was seen as more sympathetic when we realise she simply wanted a Christmas at home with her husband, and nothing to do with the law-breaking Vera. Britain's Pro-Life Alliance Party, in a press release, gave the film a cautious welcome, though some people have branded the character an 'abortion loving witch' simply because Vera wins us over as is a nice person before we find out her secret. Most people, I think, will find the film very intellectually stimulating though, and feel that a wide range of views and situations were incorporated into this brave piece of cinema that successfully portrays a pivotal epoch in British history.