Mike Leigh, British cinema's champion of the underclass, yesterday said he was relieved that his latest tale of a south London sink estate will be seen by audiences from estates rather than just art-house viewers.
All or Nothing, a bleak story of a mini-cab driver and his put-upon wife, had its UK premiere at the Edinburgh International Film Festival last night after complaints from British critics when it failed to win a prize at Cannes.
The film opens across Britain in October on 60 screens, three times as many as Leigh's 1996 success and Palme D'Or winner, Secrets and Lies, and dwarfing the reach of his recent films such as Topsy-Turvy.
It is the first film to be released by the new distribution arm of UGC multiplexes, which has launched a campaign to get British film shown outside London and the plush velvet enclaves of arthouses. The firm argued that the UK lagged behind France, Spain and other European countries in giving wide audiences access to de cent films. Leigh said: "I think it's very good news that UGC have got this film and it is reaching all areas. It's encouraging to know I'm in with a chance for this British film to infiltrate those audiences. The trouble lies with making films that don't get in front of the audiences they should. This is positive for me and most other filmmakers in the UK."
At a festival with a notably strong British programme - including Ken Loach's Sweet Sixteen and Shane Meadows's Once Upon a Time in the Midlands - Leigh reiterated his complaints that too much mainstream British film fell into "the trap of aping Hollywood".
He said: "We need more films that are properly indigenous and original. But I am optimistic for the future. Now, if the system fails young film-makers, they can use new technology to get round it."
The 59-year-old director said some young British filmmakers were being strangled by "bureaucracy and prevarication". But the industry would survive the demise of Film Four, thanks to the funding infrastructure Channel 4 put in place in the 1980s.
"I am just glad films are getting made. There was a time not so long ago, when nothing got made at all."
Leigh said All or Nothing was not intended to be a political documentary. "If it were, it would have a much wider range of social issues, and you would see a much wider range of colour of skin."
