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Product Description
Nobody noticed when Joyce Vincent died in her bedsit above a shopping mall in North London in 2003. Her body wasn t discovered for three years, surrounded by Christmas presents she had been wrapping, and with the TV still on. Newspaper reports offered few details of her life - not even a photograph.
Who was she? And how could this happen to someone in our day and age- the so-called age of communication?
Interweaving interviews with imagined scenes from Joyce s life, Dreams of a Life is an imaginative, powerful, multilayered quest, and is not only a portrait of Joyce but a portrait of London in the eighties - the City, music, and race.
It is a film about urban lives, contemporary life, and how, like Joyce, we are all different things to different people. It is about how little we may ever know each other, but nevertheless, how much we can love.
Product Description
United Kingdom released, PAL/Region 2 DVD: LANGUAGES: English ( Dolby Digital Stereo ), English ( Subtitles ), WIDESCREEN (1.78:1), SPECIAL FEATURES: Behind the scenes, Cast/Crew Interview(s), Featurette, Interactive Menu, Scene Access, Short Film, Trailer(s), SYNOPSIS: Nobody noticed when Joyce Vincent died in her bedsit above a shopping mall in North London in 2003. Her body wasn't discovered for three years, surrounded by Christmas presents she had been wrapping, and with the TV still on. Newspaper reports offered few details of her life - not even a photograph. Who was she? And how could this happen to someone in our day and age - the so-called age of communication? Interweaving interviews with imagined scenes from Joyce's life, Dreams of a Life is an imaginative, powerful, multilayered quest, and is not only a portrait of Joyce but a portrait of London in the eighties - the City, music, and race. It is a film about urban lives, contemporary life, and how, like Joyce, we are all different things to different people. It is about how little we may ever know each other, but nevertheless, how much we can love. ...Dreams of a Life
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
By jackdawsson
Format:DVD
This docu-drama about the life & deterioration of Joyce Vincent, who died aged 38, was interesting & moved me deeply. Though the role of playing Joyce doesn't seriously challenge actor Zawe Ashton, she still gives us a fine interpretation. The many interviews from her former friends & acquaintances depict a highly intelligent, vivacious, attractive woman, who was quite a socialite in her prime, even meeting Nelson Mandela. Sadly, in the last years of her life, she'd disappeared completely off the social radar, finally ending up in a bedsit provided as a refuge for battered women. It was here that her dead body lay undiscovered for 3 years.
One gets the impression that Joyce was a very complex individual struggling with many inner demons, who became a drifter in her latter years. I agree with L. Hennessey's review about some kind of depressive illness being a likely contributing factor to her deterioration. Highly intelligent people like Joyce can hide increasing depressive illness from others for longer than usual, despite the inner damage done to ones personality. The previous abusive relationship with a male companion would also have significantly exacerbated her already vulnerable condition.
This seems a reasonable explanation for her general deterioration & increasing need for social isolation. However, such was the extent of destitution portrayed overall, I felt compelled to Google more about her family, not least her 4 sisters.
I discovered that her sisters had in fact been searching for Joyce with considerable effort for a long time before she died. They even hired a private detective for the task. His search actually lasted for a long time after Joyce's lonely death.... Read more ›
One gets the impression that Joyce was a very complex individual struggling with many inner demons, who became a drifter in her latter years. I agree with L. Hennessey's review about some kind of depressive illness being a likely contributing factor to her deterioration. Highly intelligent people like Joyce can hide increasing depressive illness from others for longer than usual, despite the inner damage done to ones personality. The previous abusive relationship with a male companion would also have significantly exacerbated her already vulnerable condition.
This seems a reasonable explanation for her general deterioration & increasing need for social isolation. However, such was the extent of destitution portrayed overall, I felt compelled to Google more about her family, not least her 4 sisters.
I discovered that her sisters had in fact been searching for Joyce with considerable effort for a long time before she died. They even hired a private detective for the task. His search actually lasted for a long time after Joyce's lonely death.... Read more ›
22 of 25 people found the following review helpful
By L. Hennessy
TOP 100 REVIEWER
Format:DVD
The story of Joyce Vincent is a sad one: in 2003 she died alone in her flat at the young age of 38, where her body lay undiscovered for three years - when she was eventually discovered by bailiffs who made a forced entry, the television was still on. This documentary taps into the horror and dread that most people feel when they try to imagine how isolated a life can become for that to be possible.
The film-makers attempt to recreate a time-line of her life by interviewing people that knew her - they published public notices appealing for those who recognised her name to contact them. We see past loves, school friends and work colleagues talk to the camera as they describe an outgoing, vivacious and attractive woman who by all accounts was the centre of attention wherever she went. They all seem to be properly shocked by her fate. 'How could this have happened?' is the question that hides just underneath their spoken words.
Interspersed between these testaments are reconstruction scenes, which I felt took away from the impact of the story - I've never been a fan of this form of depicting events: in my opinion the film was edited to 90 minutes for the cinematic release, but would have really benefited from being cut down to an hour, and removing most of it. I don't need to see three and a half minutes of an actress singing along to a song in front of a wardrobe mirror with a hairbrush, for example - I *know* I'm not watching the real subject of the story, but someone pretending to be her; it got quite irritating to go through at moments. The lack of pictures or footage of the real Joyce was a powerful absence, but one that wasn't filled by these scenes.... Read more ›
The film-makers attempt to recreate a time-line of her life by interviewing people that knew her - they published public notices appealing for those who recognised her name to contact them. We see past loves, school friends and work colleagues talk to the camera as they describe an outgoing, vivacious and attractive woman who by all accounts was the centre of attention wherever she went. They all seem to be properly shocked by her fate. 'How could this have happened?' is the question that hides just underneath their spoken words.
Interspersed between these testaments are reconstruction scenes, which I felt took away from the impact of the story - I've never been a fan of this form of depicting events: in my opinion the film was edited to 90 minutes for the cinematic release, but would have really benefited from being cut down to an hour, and removing most of it. I don't need to see three and a half minutes of an actress singing along to a song in front of a wardrobe mirror with a hairbrush, for example - I *know* I'm not watching the real subject of the story, but someone pretending to be her; it got quite irritating to go through at moments. The lack of pictures or footage of the real Joyce was a powerful absence, but one that wasn't filled by these scenes.... Read more ›
19 of 23 people found the following review helpful
By W. Hill
Format:DVD
A stunning, frightening and very moving film on how you can get lost even in a big city like London. You will cry and ring a friend straight after.....
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By Kate Vane
Format:DVD
Joyce Vincent died in a flat in London in 2003 but her body was not discovered for three years. Why wasn't she missed? Film-maker Carol Morley decided to find out by tracking down those who knew her. Friends, work colleagues and former boyfriends agreed to be interviewed.
What emerges is that Joyce was not a classic loner. She was attractive and popular. She held down responsible jobs, for a while she was on the fringes of the music business. But she also appeared to have secrets. She was always moving on. She took on the interests and the social circle of her current friends, and didn't discuss her past or her life beyond their world.
There are some issues with the film and its structure. It feels more like a TV documentary than a piece of cinema, consisting of interviews intersected with some over-long and uninformative reconstructions. Morley chose not to use a voiceover which meant that she was unable to give a clear narrative structure. She used some fairly clunky techniques to get round this, such as asking interviewees to read out documents and then comment on them, or having the camera scan her handwritten timeline.
But paradoxically, allowing Joyce's friends to tell the story gave the film its power. The memories of those who knew her are fragmented, contradictory. Joyce remains elusive. With nothing but their shifting perceptions and the gaps in between, we become complicit in the story. We draw on our experiences and beliefs to create the Joyce we need.
What emerges is that Joyce was not a classic loner. She was attractive and popular. She held down responsible jobs, for a while she was on the fringes of the music business. But she also appeared to have secrets. She was always moving on. She took on the interests and the social circle of her current friends, and didn't discuss her past or her life beyond their world.
There are some issues with the film and its structure. It feels more like a TV documentary than a piece of cinema, consisting of interviews intersected with some over-long and uninformative reconstructions. Morley chose not to use a voiceover which meant that she was unable to give a clear narrative structure. She used some fairly clunky techniques to get round this, such as asking interviewees to read out documents and then comment on them, or having the camera scan her handwritten timeline.
But paradoxically, allowing Joyce's friends to tell the story gave the film its power. The memories of those who knew her are fragmented, contradictory. Joyce remains elusive. With nothing but their shifting perceptions and the gaps in between, we become complicit in the story. We draw on our experiences and beliefs to create the Joyce we need.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Heartbreaking
I always find it upsetting to read in the papers about someone dying and their body not being found for a long time, you ask yourself how such a situation could arise, where were... Read more
Published 28 days ago by Alison Petrie
5.0 out of 5 stars
sad human story
I love this film/documentary as it's written from the view of people looking in and it beggars belief that in this day and age this could happen. Read more
Published 1 month ago by ostaragirl
5.0 out of 5 stars
A film that will live on in your memory
The film/documentry is a true story of a 38 year old women that had laid dead in her flat for nearly 3 years before being found by the authorities. Read more
Published 2 months ago by DPL62
4.0 out of 5 stars
A good documentary
From such a tragic story, a very insightful picture of the life of a woman who was 'lost'. A story told by friends and acquaintances, although her family did not take part in it. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Frances Johnstone
1.0 out of 5 stars
Rubbish
What a load of old rubbish this film is not a film its a documentary about a woman who was found dead in her flat and had been there a while. Read more
Published 4 months ago by kas
5.0 out of 5 stars
Superb film
Absolutely riveting and so sad. Beautiful performance from the main character and good interviews with friends and neighbours. Read more
Published 5 months ago by lssb
4.0 out of 5 stars
Somewhere out there, in the great big void, the story is destroyed...
The above line comes from a hauntingly beautiful song by, in my opinion, Newcastle's most imperishable songwriter, Alan Hull of Lindisfarne. Read more
Published 6 months ago by ASwol83
1.0 out of 5 stars
disappointing
the story was not really informative and there was waaaaaay to much speculation. very little seemed to be based on fact, and you were really none the wiser about the person by the... Read more
Published 10 months ago by A. C. Turner
5.0 out of 5 stars
dreams of a life
A must see, too good to miss. Morley does Joyce Vincent justice by exploring her short life and her unexplained death. No one should die unnnoticed..... Read more
Published 12 months ago by link
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thought-provoking
'Dreams of a Life' is the result of a film-maker's desire to understand how it was possible for a young woman, once surrounded by friends, to die alone in London and not be missed... Read more
Published 13 months ago by rolymac4
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