
Film screening and discussion, part of the Reimagining Regional Policy Through Creative Engagement exhibition.
I, Daniel Blake (2016)
Directed by Ken Loach
Sixteen Films
Set in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, I, Daniel Blake is a powerful and unflinching drama that follows Daniel Blake (Dave Johns), a 59-year-old widower and carpenter recovering from a heart attack. Despite medical advice not to return to work, Daniel is denied Employment and Support Allowance and finds himself trapped in a bureaucratic welfare system that prioritises digital compliance over human need.
As he navigates mandatory online job searches and impersonal assessments, Daniel forms a friendship with Katie (Hayley Squires), a single mother struggling to provide for her children. Together, they confront the realities of modern poverty in the UK.
Winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes, the film is both a searing critique of the benefits system and a deeply humane portrait of dignity, solidarity, and resilience.