Forrest, D. and Merrington, P. (2021) Viewing I, Daniel Blake in the English regions: towards an understanding of realism through audience interpretation. Journal of British Cinema and Television, 18 (3). pp. 259-279. ISSN 1743-4521
Abstract
This article examines focus group responses to Ken Loach's I, Daniel Blake (2016). Situated in four English regions (North East, North West, South West and Yorkshire and Humber), the focus groups were structured around a process of film elicitation that gathered a set of plural and richly textured responses to the film. Focusing on the participants’ understanding of realism within the film, the article complements existing textual analyses of realism in order to understand better the kinds of interpretive resources that audiences bring to their engagement with films such as I, Daniel Blake. We examine in detail how participants drew on different interpretive resources as a set of personal, emotional and intellectual anchoring points that they used to situate and articulate their readings of the film. These resources ranged from related life experiences and personal memories to emotional responses and political views. In particular, we examine how participants interpreted the film through differing degrees of personal familiarity and empathy with the narrative, characters and places depicted, how the participants dealt with the emotional labours of realism and the feelings evoked through representations of place. Using film elicitation to understand the plurality of interpretations of realism has allowed us to develop a located and multifaceted understanding of the affective dimensions of realist film, and to extend the reach of audience studies to a hitherto under-explored genre.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2021 Edinburgh University Press. This is an author-produced version of a paper subsequently published in Journal of British Cinema and Television. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | film elicitation; I, Daniel Blake; interpretive resources; Ken Loach; realism |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Arts and Humanities (Sheffield) > School of English (Sheffield) |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number Arts and Humanities Research Council AH/P005780/2 |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 16 Jun 2021 11:54 |
Last Modified: | 16 Jun 2021 11:54 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Edinburgh University Press |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.3366/jbctv.2021.0574 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:175260 |