Stars of a new Ken Loach film set in a former mining community in County Durham have attended a red carpet premiere this evening.
Leading actors Ebla Mari and Dave Turner, who play a Syrian refugee and the landlord of a crumbling pub who befriends her, attended the Gala Theatre in Durham for the UK’s first showing of The Old Oak early on Thursday evening.
The acclaimed director, now 87, was due to be there but organisers said he had to pull out at the last minute.
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It completes a trilogy of North East films for Loach, who also filmed I, Daniel Blake and Sorry We Missed You in the region.
The winner of the Palme d’Or and BAFTA Outstanding British Film awards said: “The village in the film is not a single village in real life.
“We knew Easington already, some of us had worked there and we had friends there.
“Writer Paul Laverty had made the sea an important part of the story, and although the beach at Easington is no longer black with sea coal, it is still marked by industrial waste.
“Neighbouring Horden has a visually impressive collection of terraced streets, a classic example of traditional miners’ houses, built to gather round the pit.
“And Murton had an empty pub, a lovely building, with a friendly owner who helped us enormously. But while these villages were good places to work, they are typical of many, and this story could be set in all of them.”
He said making three films in the North East has been a ‘powerful experience’.
He said: “The cliches are true – a warm and generous people, a stunning landscape, and a culture built on hardship, struggle and solidarity.”
The Old Oak, which was filmed on location across east Durham , was launched to a world audience at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year.
The screenplay was written by Loach’s long-time collaborator Paul Laverty who said: “Wandering around many of these villages it was striking to talk to the older members of the community who were miners, or family of miners.
“One remarkable older lady in her nineties was a nurse and tended the wounded (one was her neighbour’s father, who still to this day lived next to her) from the Easington mining disaster of 1951 in which 83 miners died.
“Listening to vibrant people like her, and others who were involved in the miners’ strike in 1984, bore testimony to a powerful sense of community spirit, cohesion and political clarity which contrasted with the hopelessness of many in the present.
“It became apparent that “the past” should be a character in our film.
“As I wandered these villages, talking to young and old, and noticed how the dereliction of the high streets was manifest, I wondered about the inner life and spirit of the older generation as compared to the tragic story of the young mum who took her life.
“How did community solidarity, as best illustrated by the soup kitchens during the miners’ strike, disintegrate into isolation and despair?”
The new film introduces newcomer Ebla Mari as Yara, a woman with a passion for photography who moves to a pit village from her war-torn country.
It explores the plight of a desperate people who leave a refugee camp to build better lives for themselves but are met with prejudice.
Ebla said: “Yara faces a lot of hostility but then she meets TJ and they form a friendship.
“Yara wants to make life here easier and more friendly and to forge a friendship between the two communities.
“That’s very similar to what TJ’s role is, building bridges. You feel empathy towards Yara because she faces a lot of racism.”
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The pub landlord, TJ Ballantyne, is played by retired firefighter Dave Turner, who was in another Loach film, Sorry We Missed You.
He plays former miner who finds life has got on top of him.
Dave said: “He's a good man. His father was killed in a mining accident and as a consequence of that his mother bought The Old Oak pub.
“She's been dead 20 odd years and he wanted to help his mother, but his marriage has broken up, he's living in the poverty zone and the pub is struggling — as are most of the village pubs around.
“It’s the only public space left in the village but because of what's happened to him he's just been beaten down and he’s withdrawn into himself.
“Then one day, some Syrian families move into the village and that's where the story of TJ in this film starts.”
The Old Oak will be released by StudioCanal at cinemas in the UK and Ireland on September 29.
Watch the trailer for The Old Oak here
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