I, Daniel Blake is a film directed by Ken Lodge and starring Dave Jones, Hayley Squalls, Mitch McGregor and others, which premiered in the UK on 21 October 2016. The film won the Palme d'Or for Best Film at the 69th Cannes Film Festival.
The film tells the story of the difficult life of the low-level people under Britain's cumbersome and dogmatic social security welfare institutions. The protagonist of the film is Daniel Blake, a 59-year-old carpenter, who cannot work due to physical reasons (heart problems) and needs to apply for social assistance, he first applied for relief that he could not work due to disability, but this was rejected, and while waiting for an appeal, he heeded the advice to apply for unemployment benefits. But unemployment benefits in england are conditional on you having to actively look for a job, but he doesn't want to actively look for a job because he can't go to work because of heart problems, so he was warned. Later, he decided not to receive unemployment benefits, but directly waited for the outcome of the appeal for another kind of benefit, so he stopped the benefit When he tried to receive unemployment benefits, he was told that he had to take the initiative to find a job if he received the benefits, and in the process of his repeated trips to the "job center" to apply for a job, he inadvertently met Rachel, a single mother who needed to take care of two children.
The cumbersome procedures of today's British administration are like a net that holds two people firmly in place. Daniel and Rachel decide to try to help each other. The heartbreaking scene of Rachel stealing canned food because of extreme hunger, and later stealing things in the supermarket, etc., are reminiscent of the helpless life of poor people under The British dogmatic rigid system. It is a film that reflects the life of the underprivileged people in Britain, exposing social problems such as bureaucratic government agencies, cold and rigid social assistance systems, and the abandonment of the elderly by the progress of the times.
The film continues Ken Lodge's consistent style, not afraid of authority, revealing the dogma and cumbersomeness of the social welfare mechanism through the current situation of the lives of bland little people. At the same time, the details of this film are handled better, and it seems that human feelings are even more precious against the cold and ruthless background of the social mechanism.