“Haunting, compassionate and inventive” **** Dave Calhoun, Time Out
“This is a sad and intriguing story, told with imagination and care”
Sandra Hebron, Creative Director, London Film Festival
“Nothing at the London Film Festival has lingered in my mind like this”
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
“An authentically moving portrait of a forgotten life” IndieWire
Dreams of a Life is the moving, unforgettable story of Joyce ‘Carol’ Vincent who died alone in her Wood Green bedsit in 2003 and whose body lay undiscovered for three years. Director Carol Morley’s (Edge, The Alcohol Years) third feature is a poignant and yet uplifting account of a vivacious, beautiful woman who, despite outward appearances, lived and died enveloped in secrecy and mystery.
Five years in the making, Carol Morley turned detective in her quest to piece together the life of this enigmatic woman, proving more successful than police and council authorities, Carol traced Joyce’s friends, colleagues and ex-boyfriends through ads in the local press, on black cabs and via online social networks. In candid conversations with them, and using dramatised reconstructions with actress Zawe Ashton (Fresh Meat) portraying Joyce, Carol Morley deftly pieces together the life of a woman who was lively and social and yet remained detached and distant from all who knew and loved her.
Dreams of a Life is an imaginative, powerful, multi-layered quest, and is not only a portrait of Joyce but a portrait of London – 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.
xx - posted on 23/05/2012 13:13:28
