Throughout his storied career spanning more than 50 years, British filmmaker Ken Loach has delved into the lives of normal, working people struggling to live within their means. At the age of 83, Loach has garnered countless awards—including two Palme d’Or prizes from the Cannes Film Festival—and retained his keen social awareness and insight. Both are demonstrated to great effect in Loach’s latest social drama, Sorry We Missed You.

Breaking Point
The film follows the Turners, a low-income British family desperate to escape financial troubles since losing their home in the 2008 recession. To work his way out of the mountain of debt the family has amassed, Ricky gets a job as a package courier. But the new venture forces his wife, Abby, a home attendant, to sell her car so Ricky can purchase a van. As a result, the couple and their two worried teenage children are pushed to the breaking point.

Opposite of the Truth
In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Loach discussed the film’s approach to “the idea of the entrepreneur. It’s the idea that you’re your own boss while the reality is the opposite. It’s an idea that [companies] have managed to embed in peoples’ minds even though it’s the opposite of the truth.”

“The big-picture vision of the precarious economic forces holding our world together—and, increasingly, tearing it apart—make Sorry We Missed You a fraught, touching, and galvanizing movie.” —Owen Gleiberman, Variety

A Resonant Chord
Especially now, in a time when it seems everybody is feeling the need to work even when their health is on the line, the film strikes a tremendously resonant chord with its socially conscious messaging. As Wesley Morris wrote in the New York Times, the stakes “are simultaneously huge and small. The Turners don’t need much. Some stability; a steady income, of course; more time would be a dream. Really, though, the most precious thing they have is each other. But there’s no time for that because then there’d be no money.”

► See a screening of “Sorry We Missed You” at home. One ticket provides access to the film for five days. Your purchase ($12) supports the MFAH. WATCH HERE (April 1–14)