The movie that made Daniel Day-Lewis want to become an actor: “Affected me more than anything”
In 1969, Daniel Day-Lewis, one of the world’s most revered actors, was an unruly 11-year-old with a reputation for wild behaviour. Being the son of Poet Laureate C.D. Lewis, this was a big problem. Daniel’s parents resolved to send him to an independent boarding school in Sevenoaks, Kent. It was a daunting proposition for a young child, but one that would become the making of him.
Here, he stumbled upon three formative interests: woodwork, fishing and acting. The first two would end up giving Day-Lewis fans a reason to understand why he would so often leave the acting profession to pursue practical arts; the latter would provide Day-Lewis with countless accolades and worldwide recognition. After landing his first role in Sunday Bloody Sunday, for which he was paid £2 an hour to run around vandalising cars outside a local church, he was hooked. Given the young Day-Lewis’ rebellious behaviour, it’s unsurprising that he was so moved by a film he credited as one of the reasons he became an actor.
During an interview at London’s V&A ahead of the release of Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Phantom Thread, Daniel Day-Lewis, who starred as the pedantic and cruel fashion designer Reynolds Woodcock, was asked if there were any roles he wished he could have played. “I don’t think so,” he began.
“There have been performances certainly when I was starting out and discovering films, performances that filled me to the point of bursting with the desire to try to do something, but that’s always an element of believing it’s impossible that person can do that,” he added. “While I never have that feeling of ‘I wish I’d done that,’ more ‘how the hell is that possible? I hope one day I can attempt something that has that quality’”.
Opening up about one of the films that left him with that “how the hell?” feeling, the actor recalled: “Just a few days ago, I had a mate staying with me in Ireland, and we rummaged through some films I have, and he said, ‘When’s the last time you saw Kes?’
“Well, I’ve probably seen that film a dozen times, but when I first saw it – I was 12 – that film was probably one of the extraordinary films to have affected me more than anything in my life, and still does in the same way even though I’ve seen it many times. I think that’s one of the greatest seen performances I’ve ever seen, David Bradley’s – it’s so beautiful and heartbreaking. [Director] Ken Loach is really a shining light in this country. Kes was like a light going on”.
Released in 1969, Kes is an adaptation of Barry Hines’ novel A Kestral For A Knave. It tells the story of Billy, a fifteen-year-old miner’s son who forms a close bond with a wild kestrel, providing him with an escape from his life in a working-class town in Northern England. It has since become one of the bastions of British culture, a revolutionary touchpoint for capturing the nomrality of British living. You will be hard-pressed to find many Britons who haven’t been introduced and subsequently affected by the incredibly emotional picture.
The film established Ken Loach as one of the most sensitive “angry young man” directors of the 1960s. Its use of nonprofessional actors and real locations helped push the genre into a new realm of authenticity. Kes is undoubtedly one of the most influential and beloved British coming-of-age films of all time, and its impact can be tracked far beyond its own screenings.
