I couldn't understand the actions so I'm going to have to watch the whole movie in subtitles.The film tries to shy away from cute with a gritty atmosphere.David Bradley plays the cute little boy in this heart-warming, heart-breaking flick. He was so memorable that I just wanted to meet this character. The Yorkshire accent isn't distinct between some actors. But David Bradley was the standout as he gave an incredible performance as Billy for a child. But the director, besides some exceptional directing, could've picked better actors to make the characters more distinct.The screenplay is very predictable, talky and quite clichéd as the boy adventures and goes through these hard times such as students bullying kids and the religious element of going to church, which bring the movie down but if you get pass these, it's a great movie.Even if it may not be heavy in subject matters, I still don't think that kids can sit through this unless they're maybe 12, which you can tell the movie is not marketed at. Otherwise, it's an underrated and memorable film. It's a sad film if not too sad.There is swearing, nudity and stealing from the boy in this, which isn't memorable.

Kes is your archetypal social realist film, set in a working class mining town in Yorkshire. The film focuses on the life of a young boy Billy Casper and his day-to-day struggles both at home and school.Billy is presented as being mischievous and deceptive. Frustrating his teachers at school by disrupting classes and daydreaming. When he's at home, his brother Jud bullies him while his mother spares no real affection for him at all. He seems to be a child in need of salvation - with little self esteem and the gradual realisation of his inevitable future working down the coal mine. When he finds a kestrel nesting in a nearby farm, he takes it and returns home to care for it. He steals a book on falconry from a local book store and starts training the bird each day.The Kestrel sparks a passion in Billy, and provides a sense of meaning in his otherwise bleak world. This passion is realised in a scene where Billy is given the chance to talk about his bird in English class. He captivates the room with his stories about 'kes' and we finally see a positive focus for Billy and his future seems a little more hopeful.As you might expect, a gritty northern realist film doesn't end on an up note. Billy's brother Jud kills Billy's bird because he spent Jud's money for the horse racing on food for Kes. Billy is shown burying his bird in the final scene - and what becomes of Billy from this point on is unknown. The film gives an honest portrait of the social circumstances at that time, with a generation of children not having their potential realised. With believable and raw performances all round, Kes is still an affecting and powerful British film.

Grim, poignant and funny, Kes is something truly remarkable. Ken Loach's direction is just wonderful, and the whole film looks beautiful with the photography and scenery very handsome. Kes also has a moving and engaging story with realistic situations that has such authenticity to it as well, while the script is beautifully written. The pace very rarely lags either, so there is seldom a dull moment.Kes is also advantaged by some fantastic acting. Freddie Fletcher epitomises the bully big brother so well, and Brian Glover is also remarkable. However, the most outstanding performance comes from David Bradley in the lead, he is very believable and very moving as well as he finds solace in the baby kestrel from the pain of his dysfunctional family life and the torment of school, so much so you do feel for him.Overall, a brilliant film and makes me proud to be British. 10/10 Bethany Cox

"If black boxes survive air crashes, why don't they make the whole plane out of that stuff?" - George Carlin Ken Loach's "Kes", now regarded as one of the last classics of the British New Wave, tells the tale of Billy Caspter, a 13 year old kid living in the working class town of Barnsley.Billy, bullied by his mother, older brother, teachers and schoolmates, mopes about Loach's film with a look of perpetual gloom. Haggard and forlorn, Billy sees no hope in his present or future life. Society itself seems to have dismissed him as a "hopeless case", destined to work at local coal mines.Despite the world kicking him down, and despite living in a town which gives him no avenues to creatively channel his energies, Billy manages to develop a passion for birds. As such, he captures and tames a wild kestrel and teaches it to obey his commands. One of the film's best moments involves Billy, a tiny, fragile looking kid, being forced to stand up in front of his school classroom and relate something interesting about his life. Nervously he tells his teacher and schoolmates about his bird. They look at him with wonder and amazement. How can this little kid be smart, patient and dedicated enough to tame a wild animal?And that, admittedly quite naively, is the theme of the film: society doesn't give the poor and the down-trodden the chance to surprise the world and make something of themselves, Loach's kestrel, and its eventual death, symbolising a kind of social predestination in which the individual's wings are clipped before he's given the chance to fly. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy: the impoverished and the marginalized are treated in such a way as to become as they are viewed.Loach was known for these types of social realist films, tackling issues like abortion in "Up The Junction" (1965) and homelessness in "Cathy Come Home" (1966). Like most British film-makers of the time (Lindsay Anderson, Tony Richardson, John Schlesinger etc), the intention here is to angrily point fingers, give a voice to the working-class and demonize social ills until things change. Whilst Loach's contemporaries would lose this idealism, he's held his ground for over half a century.8.5/10 - A simple tale which seems to resonate across all cultures, every country in the world having an internationally well-loved film like this in their local canon. Consider, for example, France's "The 400 Blows", India's "Pather Panchali" and Iran's "Where is the friend's home?"