Vera Drake

written and directed by Mike Leigh
starring Imelda Staunton, Richard Graham, Eddie Marsan, Anna Keaveney, Alex Kelly

          Vera Drake is Mike Leigh’s most vacant story. The honor formerly went to his boring Topsy-Turvy, which at least had the music of The Mikado to keep me awake. The film takes a long time to get going, showing one abortion after another by the mousy title character. Heavy analogy is made between her job cleaning houses and “cleaning house”, as it were. Putting the kettle on becomes a simple part of such everyday occurrences as teatime and premeditated miscarriage. Imelda Staunton’s Oscar-nominated performance is as plainly real as Leigh typically gets from his actors and involves seemingly little effort in its balance of quiet innocence and quiet guilt, the latter shown with non-stop crying. The script’s second half is straightforward and obvious even while no longer as somnolent.

Expectation Key


there's no possible way we will even see this

we'll eventually see this but we aren't really expecting much

anticipating the release of this one but we're sure to be left unsatisfied

such high expectation of this film only leaves room for disappointment