Biography for
Ken Loach
Date of Birth: 17 June 1936, Nuneaton, Warwickshire, England, UK
Unlike virtually all his contemporaries, Ken Loach has never succumbed to the siren call of Hollywood, and it's virtually impossible to imagine his particular brand of British socialist realism translating well to that context. After studying law at St. Peter's College, Oxford, he branched out into the theater, performing with a touring repertory company. This led to television, where in alliance with producer 'Tony Garnett' he produced a series of docudramas, most notably the devastating "Cathy Come Home" episode of "The Wednesday Play" (1964), whose impact was so massive that it led directly to a change in the homeless laws. He made his feature debut Poor Cow (1967) the following year, and with "Kes", he produced what is now acclaimed as one of the finest films ever made in Britain. However, the following two decades saw his career in the doldrums with his films poorly distributed (despite the obvious quality of work such as The Gamekeeper (1968) (TV) and Looks and Smiles (1981)) and his TV work in some cases never broadcast (most notoriously, his documentaries on the 1984 miners' strike). But he made a spectacular comeback in the 1990s, with a series of award-winning films firmly establishing him in the pantheon of great European directors - his films have always been more popular in mainland Europe than in his native country or the US (where Riff-Raff (1991) was shown with subtitles because of the wide range of dialects) Hidden Agenda (1990) won the Special Jury Prize at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival; Riff-Raff (1991) won the Felix award for Best European Film of 1992; Raining Stones (1993) won the Cannes Special Jury Prize for 1993, and 'Land and Freedom' won the FIPRESCI International Critics Prize and the Ecumenical Jury Prize at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival -and was a substantial box-office hit in Spain where it sparked intense debate about its subject matter. This needless to say, was one of the reasons that Loach made the film!
Biography By: Michael Brooke
Biography for
Paul Laverty
Date of Birth: 1957, Calcutta, India
Paul Laverty was born in Calcutta, India, to an Irish mother and Scottish father. He obtained a Philosophy degree at the Gregorian University in Rome. Thereafter he obtained a law degree in Glasgow and went on to do an apprenticeship with two of Scotland's most celebrated lawyers. He became a practising lawyer. In the mid eighties he travelled to Nicaragua, Central America, and lived there for almost three years. He worked for a Nicaraguan human rights organisation During this time he travelled widely in Guatemala and El Salvador which were both in a state of civil war. Laverty received the Fullbright Award in 1984 and lived in Los Angeles for 18 months. After his time in Central America Laverty made contact with the director Ken Loach and since then they have been working in constant collaboration.
As a law student he once hitch-hiked across the United States from New York to Los Angeles with many surreal experiences in between. He won a Fullbright Award to study film in the U.S. based on an open screenplay competition. During his time in California he researched a story while living with Latinos in McArthur Park, down-town Los Angeles, which finally became the film "Bread and Roses" which starred the future Oscar winner Adrien Brodie. He received an Honorary PH.D from Strathclyde University, Glasgow, Scotland in 2003. On a trip to China he was once accidentally flattened by an over enthusiastic Buddhist monk who was keen to show off his King Fu skills and got carried away. Paul works between Madrid, London and Glasgow and speaks good Spanish. Every project in which Paul and Ken have collaborated has premiered in the official section of a major "A" list European festival, either Cannes (3 times) Venice (twice) or Berlin (once). Together they have won a string of international prizes. My Name is Joe and Sweet Sixteen won the best British Independent Film Award in 2000 and 2002 respectively.
