LIFE IS SWEET

This invigorating film from Mike Leigh was his first international sensation. Melancholy and funny by turns, it is an intimate portrait of a working-class family in a suburb just north of London—an irrepressible mum and dad (Alison Steadman and Jim Broadbent) and their night-and-day twins, a bookish good girl and a troubled, ill-tempered layabout (Claire Skinner and Jane Horrocks). Leigh and his typically brilliant cast create, with extraordinary sensitivity and craft, a vivid, lived-in story of ordinary existence, in which even modest dreams—such as the father’s desire to open a food truck—carry enormous weight. One of Leigh’s funniest and most tender films is also one of his most optimistic about family ties.

“Mike Leigh's work has always imbued a respect for struggling individuals, and how the kindness of life in little moments means so much in the expanse of an existence that rarely rises above modesty. LIFE IS SWEET is about the dynamics of a working-class family unit, but it's also about their limitations, how they choose to push past their daily troubles, or when to accept resignation. Complex, fully lived-in and drop-dead gorgeous.” - SilentDawn