Britain’s Ken Loach is a contemporary master of left-wing movie social realism–and one of his most slashingly political recent films is “The Navigators,” which opens Friday at Facets Multimedia.
Released in Britain in 2001, “The Navigators” is a potent inside look at the economic wreckage of the Thatcher-Major years, of human casualties created by the Tories’ privatization of Britain’s railroad industry. It’s a highly personal look, written by Rob Dawber, an ex-British Rail worker who, like his mates, eventually lost his job, but later wrote a stinging, ultra-realistic script about his old workplace, here filmed by Loach. Tragically, right before the release of “The Navigators,” Dawber died of an asbestos-related cancer contracted at work.
“The Navigators” shows the harsh lot of a group of long-time South Yorkshire railroad workers, some of whom are privatized out of their jobs one morning and all of whose lives grow rapidly worse. They’re a close-knit crew, chummy with their old bosses and, at first, they greet the new changes with rowdy humor. (The cast includes a number of British comic actors, including Steve Huison of “The Full Monty”–and comedy ripples through the story right up to its bleak climax.)
Yet soon more workers are squeezed out of their jobs; some nudged into private crews that compete with their old workmates. Meanwhile, we see the new management, a set of arrogant and brutal twerps, threaten the crews’ old bosses while, in the name of economy, safety checks and rules are decreased so dramatically that tragedy results–a symbolic nod perhaps to the Hatfield Rail disaster of 2000, one of the fruits of real-life privatization.
Here, the disaster is smaller, personal but devastating. Typically, Loach again works all his old magic for creating vivid images and guiding burningly alive, explosive performances.
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“The Navigators” ((star)(star)(star)1/2) opens Friday at Facets Multimedia, 1517 W. Fullerton Ave. In English, with thick-but-understandable Yorkshire accents. No MPAA rating. Adult (for language and sensuality).
