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Vera Drake
Fine Line Features


7.9

based on 40 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 28 votes
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FILM:

MPAA RATING: R for depiction of strong thematic material

Starring Imelda Staunton, Richard Graham, Eddie Marsan, Anna Keaveney, Alex Kelly, Daniel Mays, Philip Davis, and Lesley Manville

A portrait of a back street abortionist in 1950's London.

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Mike Leigh
DIRECTED BY:	Mike Leigh
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: March 29, 2005 Theatrical: October 10, 2004
RUNNING TIME:	125 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	UK / France / New Zealand

Golden Lion and Vopli Cup (Best Actress - Staunton), 2004 Venice Film Festival

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

Variety David Rooney

Mike Leigh is at the peak of his powers with Vera Drake, a compassionate, morally complex drama that stands easily alongside his best work, "Secrets & Lies" and "Topsy-Turvy."

100

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Vera Drake puts the passion in compassion. Building up to a shattering conclusion, Leigh's movie is both outrageously schematic and powerfully humanist.

100

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Stunning and compassionate period drama.

100

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

The acting is brilliant and Leigh's screenplay - developed through his usual process of improvisation and rehearsal - is very long on compassion, very short on preaching and politics.

100

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

A marvel of character-driven drama that no serious filmgoer should miss.

100

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Among its many excellences, Vera Drake functions superbly as a pure thriller; the last half is reminiscent in structure and detail of Hitchcock's "The Wrong Man."

100

USA Today Mike Clark

This is the kind of people-driven story that the movies used to give us - before special effects took over.

100

Washington Post Desson Thomson

Few movies have evoked the happiness of a good, strong family as genuinely as this one. And this affecting atmosphere makes the eventual outcome resonate with great power.

100

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

The strength of Leigh's film is that it is not a message picture, but a deep and true portrait of these lives.

100

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

In absorbing drama and staggering emotions, it renders an issue too often seen as black or white in heartbreaking gray.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

There's nothing harder for an actor to play than a thoroughly good character, and Staunton does it with a dowdy, sublime originality.

Washington Post Sean Daly

Sweet, strange and ultimately heartbreaking.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

Much of the film's potency derives from its personal edge -- the passion for precise period decor, the title dedicating the film to Leigh's parents (a doctor and midwife), and even the childlike classification of many characters as either good souls or villains.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

As an evocation of English working-class life half a century ago, it feels utterly authentic, and is ennobled -- not too strong a word, I think -- by Imelda Staunton's performance in the title role.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

The English director Mike Leigh's best work in a decade.

Dallas Observer Melissa Levine

Vera Drake is so patient, assiduous and attentive to emotional accuracy that it betrays the utter sloth of most of what we see when we go to the movies.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

The film is startlingly even-handed.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

It does a masterful job of capturing a specific time and place while reminding us how timeless the abortion dialogue is.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Confirms Leigh's reputation as one of the world's master filmmakers - and showcases Staunton as one of its great actresses.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

For those who have the patience to become absorbed in this kind of drama, Vera Drake offers a stunningly real character portrait whose image will linger long after the movie has faded.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Using Staunton's face as his canvas, Leigh crafts a powerfully moving film that is unmissable and unforgettable.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

No filmmaker, in any cinematic culture, has a better eye or ear for the working class than director Mike Leigh.

Empire Kim Newman

Painful for many reasons, but highly recommended.

The Hollywood Reporter Ray Bennett

It's difficult to think of another recent film so seamlessly rendered or that envelops an audience so completely in its period authenticity.

The New Yorker David Denby

Marvellous, though it is smaller in emotional range than such earlier Mike Leigh films as the goofy bourgeois satire "High Hopes" (1988), the candid and piercing "Secrets & Lies" (1996), and the splendid theatrical spectacle "Topsy-Turvy" (1999).

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

One of the letdowns of Vera Drake is that once Vera is arrested, we lose her voice.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

The issue may be polarizing, but Vera Drake resonates with such seriousness and truth that it transcends the narrow limitations of polemic.

Time Richard Schickel

This very patient film reaches out and unshakably grips us.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

In an era in which too many of us automatically accept women's right to choose, Vera Drake reminds us that the time for complacency is not now.

Premiere Glenn Kenny

Imelda Staunton is absolutely astonishing.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

In the end, this is a movie that doesn't respect its own power. Less of a stacked deck would have left Vera Drake to play a far more effective hand.

Miami Herald Connie Ogle

Makes a compelling argument for women's rights without ever succumbing to preachiness.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Expansive, but succinct. Leigh tells a small story and doesn't try to make something huge of it.

Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano

As lovely and heartbreaking as Staunton is to watch, there's something about Leigh's attachment to his politics that leaches some complexity from the experience

The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann

Leigh's directing is lean and tight. In Imelda Staunton as Vera, he has an actress who can make her only two emotions interesting.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Staunton is phenomenal - she barely speaks throughout the entire last third of the film, but the power of her posture and distraught expressions are enough to break your heart.

Salon.com Charles Taylor

When one of the young women Vera attends to nearly dies of complications, the police arrest her -- and the movie goes thud, taking Staunton's performance along with it.

Slate David Edelstein

Marathon of misery.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

As a character study Vera Drake is coarsely drawn, and as pro-choice polemic, it’s both a blunt instrument and a red herring. Which may be why, among all the moviegoers who staggered from the theater wielding soaked tissues, I was among the few who remained dry of eye, and raised of brow.

Film Threat Phil Hall

The film's screenplay is thick with major lapses in logic, resulting in a story that ultimately makes little sense.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.9 (out of 10) based on 28 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

H C. gave it a5:
I agree almost word for word with the reviewer "Roland D." I did think the first half was quite good so I'm giving it a 5, but really the second half just dies on-screen. The realization that Leigh isn't really taking us anywhere is such a disappointment that it really tarnishes the acting and makes it seem sort of masturbatory --really, I bet it's an actors wet dream to be in a Mike Leigh film. But the acting should be in service of something more than just the acting itself (i.e. plot/story/anything).

David P. gave it a10:
Authentic and powerful.

Cesar B. gave it a10:
Wish I could give it an eleven. Best mainstream film of '04. Performances are stunning all around. Production tight. See it now.

Roland D. gave it a2:
This is a truly dreadful film. Mike Leigh develops his screenplays through a lengthy process of improvisation where the characters and stories are created (the films themselves are not improvised). What this means is that the narratives depend on the chemistry and dynamics of performance. At is best the results can be sublime (such as in ‘Naked’), at its worse, as in Vera Drake, we have a hotchpotch of actor’s mannerisms and stereotypes within a weakly structured, entirely superficial drama. Set in an apocalyptically bleak 50’s London, the familiar Leigh archetypes are all here. The downtrodden working class wallow in a cosy but inarticulate solidarity, their drab lives only brightened by prodigious tea-drinking and cigarettes. The middle class are vacuous, smug and insular. Worst of all are the upwardly aspiring working class who have sacrificed their roots for dreams of suburban respectability. This is the world in which we find Vera Drake, a painfully decent sort of woman whose spare-time is spent ‘helping girls out’ (performing abortions) for free. Vera has been doing this for twenty years, secretly, seemingly oblivious to the moral dilemmas and the risk not only of imprisonment but the potentially fatal consequences of her work. She is also blind to the fact that her childhood friend, who delivers the girls to Vera, has been making a nice little earner out of black market groceries and charging handsomely for Vera’s services. Believe all that and you might possibly believe Leigh has something new to say about what are, obviously, important social and political issues, and that he is world class filmmaker. I, for one, don’t. As in many of Leigh’s films, we have lots of acting but no depth, lots of tears and grim smiles but no real drama. The characters are wafer thin, plumped up by all the tricks and ticks that good actors can pull out of the bag, but at no point do we have any insight into what is going on inside Vera or anyone else’s head. Scenes drag on, information is repeated again and again to pile on the agony while we stare at the peeling brown wallpaper and pour another cup of tea. Within the first few minutes you know where this film is going, and there are no surprises other than the fact that so many people have willingly watched this film through to the end.

Chad K gave it a9:
Fantastic character driven film, in typical Mike Leigh fashion. Strong perfomances from the entire cast. The film is also a good historical account of how our views evolve as time goes on. My only problem with Vera Drakes character was how in the beginning such an apparently strong, confident woman could turn into such a sobing mess as the end.

armando s. gave it a10:
A better movie than the manipulative MILLION DOLLAR BABY. Imelda Staunton should have won the Oscar, but her role was too contoversial for the timid Oscar voters. A film that challenges your preconceptions and opens your eyes. Highly recommended.

Greg m gave it an8:
That was a gritty, dark and dour British period piece about an abortionist, with a heart of gold. Imelda Staunton and all of the cast were terrific and at one point, I said to the person watching this movie with me - "It almost seems like we are eavesdropping on their lives. It seems so real". The ironic part is that laws change and people who are convicted of crimes at one time are innocent in another era. Now, if you want an abortion, you take the "morning after" pill. Vera Drake would not have been convicted in the year 2005.

Vera Drake Fine Line Features

Vera Drake
Fine Line Features