“Is this Life?” Resolutions, Humour and Family in Mike Leigh’s Secrets & Lies

In this essay I would like to argue that in Secrets and Lies Mike Leigh is suggesting that secrets cause tensions in families and destroys relationships between family members. Firstly, I would like to consider that it is actually true according my own experience because there is been some lies and hidden secrets in my family as well and once they are exposed, it causes embarrassments to those whom are affected. Secondly, I believe secrets can form a negative and positive impact once they are exposed because, it can be a turning point where families consider reuniting and leave the past behind which obviously happens in Secrets and Lies. Sometimes it happens
On the one hand, I don’t think Secrets and Lies weren’t clarified enough for one to understand what is really going on. On the other hand, I believe Leigh didn’t want to include unnecessary scenes in order to make it too long and simply erase its taste for some audience to be able to watch more than once. Still I strongly believe that some find Secrets and Lies as their favourite depending on their interests. Especially for those who relate it to their own environments in real life.
I’m going to look at the race issue which most viewers regard as a main concept and also was on how Mike Leigh himself, responds to this during an interview. When asked if Secrets and Lies emphases on a race aspect, Mike Leigh replies, it’s not what he focuses on and he also indicates that its only idiots who do think that way about the fact that Hortense is black and Cynthia is white because, some don’t even know that it is 1996 and people have learned to live with the race issue behind in some societies. In fact, he backs up his statement describing Hortense’s character stating that, “As you get to know her, you simply forget that she's black because you get to know her and it ceases to be an issue.”(Miller) I see Leigh’s point on the race aspect here because, it is 1996 when Secret and Lies came out and at that time, some societies consists of mixed races where racism is limited to a minimum point. Perhaps he wanted to point