Loach's Looking for Eric combines some of the best work he's previously done in regards to a realistic, low-level set aesthetic combined with some universal themes of contemporary middle aged men in crisis, all the while filtered through the light comedy and crime drama genres. It's to the film's great credit that it doesn't linger too often on one of the items Loach explored here, while this project in the hands of a lesser director may well have come across as more misguided than it actually does here. As a journey of self-discovery; a horrifying urban crime tale and a study of mental illness, the film covers enough ground on most levels without ever feeling like it caters for any of the above.
The film plunges the viewer head first into the world of a certain Eric Bishop (Evets); who's a single and ageing postman living in Manchester with son Jess (Gumbs) and stepson Ryan (Kearns), in a small house that results in messy and cramped living conditions. The film begins and concludes with two very different, but somewhat equally frightening, sequences with the first thing we're presented with being a suicide attempt that sees Eric driving the wrong way around a roundabout. The film finishes off its narrative with a sequence that resembles what a number of 2004 film Dead Man's Shoes' scenes might've looked like had it been co-made by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright.
But Bishop isn't the only Eric of the film, indeed footballer Eric Cantona makes a number of brief appearances as himself in both found footage format, when the film displays a number instances in which he is playing football, as well as in hallucinatory form when postman Eric sees him and talks to him. In decoding the title of the film, we establish the sort of arc its lead will go on. Whatever initial 'looking' in regards to Eric anybody does is postman Eric's searching for some kind of way to make sense of everything; this is then followed by a 'looking' for himself, a searching of one's self and how one can overcome the obstacles such as marital issues; maintaining healthy relationships with one's friends and family members as well as an alarming situation which arises to do with a firearm.
Bishop escapes to his own space, his bedroom, when things get tougher than they ought to be when at home with his sons and their own friends whom clutter things up even more. Further still, he uses Cantona, and memories of Cantona as a footballer, to escape to a happier time and place. He hasn't been to a match at his beloved Manchester United for many years, and can only gaze on in a forlorn state at his sons as they clamber into a black jeep with their own contacts, match bound. Eric's despair; suicidal ideation and what we have to perceive as his schizophrenia, are all handled with the greatest of respects. When Cantona first appears and begins to communicate with Eric, he takes him through the process of confronting both the past and his flaws in a very realistic and down to Earth manner; asking him to explore what is inside of Eric's bedroom trunk, which mostly houses memorabilia from Eric's marriage to now estranged child-hood sweetheart named Lily. This premise of forthrightly confronting one's fears is relatively simplistic but works well. From here, the film beautifully spaces the interactions between either Eric, and allows the character of Bishop to naturally progress.
In addition to the principal study running throughout, Loach retreads some old ground that recalls the sorts of work he did in both 1991's Riff Raff and 2001's The Navigators; this when he enters a comfort zone which provides some fascinating, dialogue driven cinema in some everyday locations as those of a working class sit around and just talk in that ultra-realistic manner Loach seems to execute with consummate ease, every time making for riveting viewing and desperately straddling that fine line between documentary and fiction. You know the instances I mean; those times when it's as if the actors are still talking on the set but the cameras have been accidentally left running. But I think Loach identifies the severity and sensitive nature of his primary subject matter, thus he limits these sorts of scenes to only one or two occasions. The comedy is additionally blended in well, with no aim to exploit the respective situations; with instances such as Eric accidentally spraying paint onto his work clothes and his stepson encountering him in the kitchen shouting "No!", in French, after Cantona told him to.
Looking for Eric is a tasteful observation of a man in crisis, someone whom you think is able to enjoy what life has to throw at him, but finds it difficult to channel it towards the surface and therefore express it. The notion of hallucinating a figure to help you through times of distress is something that has been explored before, but Loach brings something different to it; something I wouldn't describe as 'lighthearted', more-so 'delicate', or just down to Earth. Refreshingly, the sensation that a person is seeing and actually communicating with something that's not there isn't overplayed or put across as this amazing; fantastic event that everyone's attention should be drawn to. Loach observes the USP, but does not make it the centrepiece of his film; rather, he allows it to play out around a story of identifying meaningful friendships and rectifying marital mistakes. Well handled; well executed and not over-egged nor patronising, Looking for Eric buries the proverbial volley with aplomb.
The film plunges the viewer head first into the world of a certain Eric Bishop (Evets); who's a single and ageing postman living in Manchester with son Jess (Gumbs) and stepson Ryan (Kearns), in a small house that results in messy and cramped living conditions. The film begins and concludes with two very different, but somewhat equally frightening, sequences with the first thing we're presented with being a suicide attempt that sees Eric driving the wrong way around a roundabout. The film finishes off its narrative with a sequence that resembles what a number of 2004 film Dead Man's Shoes' scenes might've looked like had it been co-made by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright.
But Bishop isn't the only Eric of the film, indeed footballer Eric Cantona makes a number of brief appearances as himself in both found footage format, when the film displays a number instances in which he is playing football, as well as in hallucinatory form when postman Eric sees him and talks to him. In decoding the title of the film, we establish the sort of arc its lead will go on. Whatever initial 'looking' in regards to Eric anybody does is postman Eric's searching for some kind of way to make sense of everything; this is then followed by a 'looking' for himself, a searching of one's self and how one can overcome the obstacles such as marital issues; maintaining healthy relationships with one's friends and family members as well as an alarming situation which arises to do with a firearm.
Bishop escapes to his own space, his bedroom, when things get tougher than they ought to be when at home with his sons and their own friends whom clutter things up even more. Further still, he uses Cantona, and memories of Cantona as a footballer, to escape to a happier time and place. He hasn't been to a match at his beloved Manchester United for many years, and can only gaze on in a forlorn state at his sons as they clamber into a black jeep with their own contacts, match bound. Eric's despair; suicidal ideation and what we have to perceive as his schizophrenia, are all handled with the greatest of respects. When Cantona first appears and begins to communicate with Eric, he takes him through the process of confronting both the past and his flaws in a very realistic and down to Earth manner; asking him to explore what is inside of Eric's bedroom trunk, which mostly houses memorabilia from Eric's marriage to now estranged child-hood sweetheart named Lily. This premise of forthrightly confronting one's fears is relatively simplistic but works well. From here, the film beautifully spaces the interactions between either Eric, and allows the character of Bishop to naturally progress.
In addition to the principal study running throughout, Loach retreads some old ground that recalls the sorts of work he did in both 1991's Riff Raff and 2001's The Navigators; this when he enters a comfort zone which provides some fascinating, dialogue driven cinema in some everyday locations as those of a working class sit around and just talk in that ultra-realistic manner Loach seems to execute with consummate ease, every time making for riveting viewing and desperately straddling that fine line between documentary and fiction. You know the instances I mean; those times when it's as if the actors are still talking on the set but the cameras have been accidentally left running. But I think Loach identifies the severity and sensitive nature of his primary subject matter, thus he limits these sorts of scenes to only one or two occasions. The comedy is additionally blended in well, with no aim to exploit the respective situations; with instances such as Eric accidentally spraying paint onto his work clothes and his stepson encountering him in the kitchen shouting "No!", in French, after Cantona told him to.
Looking for Eric is a tasteful observation of a man in crisis, someone whom you think is able to enjoy what life has to throw at him, but finds it difficult to channel it towards the surface and therefore express it. The notion of hallucinating a figure to help you through times of distress is something that has been explored before, but Loach brings something different to it; something I wouldn't describe as 'lighthearted', more-so 'delicate', or just down to Earth. Refreshingly, the sensation that a person is seeing and actually communicating with something that's not there isn't overplayed or put across as this amazing; fantastic event that everyone's attention should be drawn to. Loach observes the USP, but does not make it the centrepiece of his film; rather, he allows it to play out around a story of identifying meaningful friendships and rectifying marital mistakes. Well handled; well executed and not over-egged nor patronising, Looking for Eric buries the proverbial volley with aplomb.