Vera Drake

Rating

Director

Mike Leigh

Screenplay

Mike Leigh

Length

2h 05m

Starring

Imelda Staunton, Richard Graham, Eddie Marsan, Anna Keaveney, Alex Kelly, Daniel Mays, Phil Davis, Lesley Manville, Sally Hawkins, Simon Chandler, Sam Troughton, Marion Bailey

MPAA Rating

R

Review

What was an important film when it was released in 2004 has now become a rallying cry for many women. Vera Drake takes audiences back in time to a period in history when abortion was not legal and the ramifications that had not just on the women who needed one, but on those who quietly provided them.

Imelda Staunton stars as a middle class housewife who cares for others while leading a seemingly average life. She has a husband and children and they live in a small apartment. By day, she cleans the houses of the upper classes. Secretly in her spare time, she helps young women get the abortion care they desperately need. Staunton’s performance is gentle and loving, a departure from many of the roles she would assume in subsequent years, including as the detestable Dolores Umbridge in the later Harry Potter films. Here, she’s compassionate, caring, and as prepared as she can be for the day when her carefully arranged house of cards comes crashing down. Without incident for twenty years, one of the girls she cares for ends up in the hospital, which leads the police to her doorstep and her guarded world begins crumbling around her.

Mike Leigh’s filmmaking style differs from many. Beginning with table reads of his script, he welcomes input from his actors to add life and vitality to their characters, often fleshing out what were once solid figures, turning them into vibrant and relatable individuals. Leigh’s style of directing isn’t about the flourish and the excess, yet his films feel effervescent and effortless at the same time. His intention with this film is clear: expose the dark days for women who were imperiled by the law, days that may once again be upon us.

Vera Drake is a courageous figure. Although she knew the risks she was taking in providing care for the unfortunate, she continues to perform them and unapologetically acknowledges her role and its necessity when everything takes a turn for the worse. Staunton’s worry about not just her own future, but that of her family and the women she might never again be able to help, keeps Vera centered for the audience. It’s a masterful performance that was under-rewarded in its time.

While the United Kingdom remains a generally safe space for young women seeking compassionate care, the United States has been reaching back to a time when women risked life and injury simply for seeking to control their own bodies. As women’s rights activists have said many times over the years, it’s not a matter of outlawing abortions, it’s an issue of making safe abortions illegal. Vera Drake acts as a potent reminder of where society has been and it was a frightening and dangerous period of history that no woman should have to re-live and this film makes that crystal clear.

Review Written

July 20, 2022