Production Budget Analysis

The production budget for Kes (1970) has not been publicly disclosed.

CAST: David Bradley, Freddie Fletcher, Lynne Perrie, Colin Welland, Brian Glover, Bob Bowes DIRECTOR: Ken Loach CINEMATOGRAPHY: Chris Menges MUSIC: John Cameron PRODUCTION: Woodfall Film Productions, Kestrel Films

Box Office Performance

Theatrical box office data is not publicly available for Kes (1970). This may indicate a limited release, direct-to-streaming, or a release predating modern box office tracking.

Profitability Assessment

Insufficient publicly available data to assess profitability.

INDUSTRY IMPACT

PRODUCTION NOTES

▸ Production

The film (and the book upon which it was based, by Barry Hines) were semi-autobiographical, Hines having been a teacher in the school in which it was set, and wishing to critique the education system of the time. His younger brother Richard had found a new life after his student experiences at the local secondary modern school by training the original bird "Kes", the inspiration for the movie. Richard assisted the movie production by acting as the handler for the birds in the film. Both brothers grew up in the area shown in the film, and their father was a worker in the local coal mine, though he was a kind man in contrast to the absentee father in the film. Both the film and the book provide a portrait of life in the mining areas of Yorkshire of the time; reportedly, the miners in the area were then the lowest-paid workers in a developed country. Shortly before the film's release, the Yorkshire coalfield where the film was set was brought to a standstill for two weeks by an unofficial strike.

Set in and around Barnsley, the film was one of the first of several collaborations between Ken Loach and Barry Hines that used authentic Yorkshire dialect. The extras were all hired from in and around Barnsley. The DVD version of the film has certain scenes dubbed over with fewer dialect terms than in the original. In a 2013 interview, director Ken Loach said that, upon its release, United Artists organised a screening of the film for some American executives and they said that they could understand Hungarian better than the dialect in the film.

The production company was set up with the name "Kestrel Films". Ken Loach and Tony Garnett used this for some of their later collaborations such as Family Life and The Save the Children Fund Film.

▸ Filming & Locations

The film was shot on location, including in St Helens School, Athersley South, and Edward Sheerien School (demolished in 2011); and in and around the streets of Hoyland and Hoyland Common in South Yorkshire. A number of the shooting locations are detailed in a "then and now" comparison page compiled by Adam Scovell in 2018.

[Filming locations] The film was shot on location, including in St Helens School, Athersley South, and Edward Sheerien School (demolished in 2011); and in and around the streets of Hoyland and Hoyland Common in South Yorkshire. A number of the shooting locations are detailed in a "then and now" comparison page compiled by Adam Scovell in 2018.

AWARDS & RECOGNITION

Summary: Won 2 BAFTA 6 wins & 5 nominations total

Awards Won: ★ National Board of Review: Top Ten Films ★ Crystal Globe (17th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival)

CRITICAL RECEPTION

The film took several months to find a cinema release. It was eventually picked up by ABC Cinemas and had a successful run in some cinemas in north England which went very well and led to the film being expanded throughout Britain. The movie became a word-of-mouth hit, eventually making a profit. However, it was a commercial flop in the US and was withdrawn after two days. In his four-star review, Roger Ebert said that the film failed to open in Chicago, and attributed the problems to the Yorkshire accents. Ebert saw the film at a 1972 showing organised by the Biological Honor Society at the Loyola University Chicago, which led him to ask, "were they interested in the movie, or the kestrel?" Nevertheless, he described the film as "one of the best, the warmest, the most moving films of recent years".

In an essay included with the 2016 Blu-ray release of the film, commentator Philip Kent writes:

Reflecting on changes in the film's locale and setting in the intervening 40-odd years, Graham Fuller wrote in 2011:

Reviewing the film in 2009 for www.frenchfilms.org, James Travers wrote:

Graeme Ross, writing in 2019 in The Independent, placed the film 8th in his "best British movies of all time", saying: