Ghosts [2006] [DVD]

This film did not get a full cinema release and the fact that it has not yet received the publicity it rightly deserves is an absolute crime. In the age of attention-grabbing sensationalised docu-cinema (Fahrenheit 911, Super Size Me, The Yes Men et al.) a film such as Ghosts, which tells the truth in such an objective and gripping way is a breath of fresh air.

Seasoned documentary-maker, Nick Broomfield manages to produce a piece of dramatic cinema which captures the essence of his documentaries, but involves the audience much more intimately with the subjects than has been possible in his previous work. From the use of a non-professional Chinese cast, through the purposely shaky camera work and even to the slightly poorly acted role of the English landlord whose property is crammed with 15 'illegals', this film just seems real.

Ghosts is very now and very timely, given the recent 200th anniversary of the abolition of the legal slave trade. It serves as a reminder that there are still millions of people throughout the world living under the control of money-lenders/gang-masters, below the radar of the general public and in the turned blind eye of their employers who get a plentiful supply of cheap labour.

Ghosts is extremely moving and most viewers will sympathise with the plight of the lead character, Ai Qin and indeed with the alleged 3 million illegal workers who are locked in to a life of hard labour in the UK's primary industries in order to pay debts which they may never clear and who may never see their homelands or families again. If anyone goes away from this film with anything but a desire to help them it will be a disappointment. At the very least I hope Ghosts will go someway to quell the increasing hostility towards immigrants in the UK; I hope that once people see the human story behind the politico-economic issue, they will think twice before criticising them.

The film's lack of publicity may be down Broomfield's lack of funding when compared to the aforementioned films which were all financed in the US. Another possibility may be that, even given the analogy with the popular docu-films, this is still in fact a dramatisation, meaning perhaps one of Broomfield's documentaries would have fared better in the current box office climate (even though this would have been impossible for this particular story).

All said, Ghosts is by far the best Nick Broomfield work I have seen and I get the feeling that it will be one of those films that increases in popularity over time purely due to word-of-mouth.

Ghosts is a shrewd name for this film, taking on various connotations as the film progresses, before eventually becoming an apt one, as you're left haunted by its events.

With his background in hard-hitting documentaries, it's no surprise that Nick Broomfield poses many uncomfortable questions and tackles similarly chunky issues which extend much farther than the core narrative with this superb film based on the deaths of the twenty-three Chinese cockle pickers at Morecambe Bay in 2004. The tragedy itself is almost of secondary concern, this is not an exploitation of that event, Broomfield instead chooses to focus on the events that placed the illegal immigrants in such a perilous position. It comes across as a film about modern-day Britain as much as anything.

The film's protagonist, Ai Qin Li, is a young impoverished Chinese mother hoping, like many, to make a better living in Britain, illegally. Broomfield holds no punches. While the film is seen from the perspective of the migrant workers, we are reminded how they unlawfully take jobs, often with the help of bungs and always with forged documents. While they are treated unpleasantly (at best) by British citizens in all respects, you can empathise with the local gang of cockle pickers who object to them threatening their livelihoods, even if it's impossible to approve of their brutish bullying. It is the violent attack in this particular scene that forces the Chinese to return to the deadly estuaries of Morecambe Bay after dark.

Broomfield doesn't paint a picture of black and white, right and wrong, but the name-checking of the major supermarkets alludes to the real villain, and the employment agencies who the workers sign up with are also portrayed as corrupt. For the most part it's perfectly judged by Broomfield, right up to the credits where he sends viewers on a guilt trip about how the British government has done nothing to pay off the heavy debts of the dead which their families are now burdened with. Leaving you wondering just why it is that Broomfield thinks it should. It's the kind of thing that might give Bono and Chris Martin bad ideas.

Overall for Broomfield the filmmaker, it's a major success, genuinely thought-provoking and memorable, and probably the best thing he's done to date by some distance. It's very much a dramatic piece but plays on his strengths as a documentary maker. On its own it would be an easy recommendion for your DVD collection, but the bonus Making Of documentary is also a valuable extra and the scene in which Broomfield and his crew are faced with a gang of hostile local cockle pickers while filming mirrors the events in the film.

Nick Broomfield turns his hand to fictive feature film-making brilliantly, narrativising this tale around the drowning of illegal Chinese immigrants whilst cockle-picking in Morecambe Bay back in 2004. The film is a powerful dramatisation that looks and feels almost more realistic than Broomfield's documentaries. Focusing in on the experiences of one woman (the excellent Ai Qin Lin) Ghosts tells a personal and moving story, drawing attention to incredibly important issues. Very affecting.