Times are changing! I went to the pictures on Saturday to watch a film about a man who strived to do good. You could say he was a vigilante, albeit a tortured one.

While he fought to keep his neighbourhood safe he struggled with loneliness, an inability to form relationships and a fear of commitment.

The film was The Lego Batman Movie .

This Batman was jealous of Superman, however, and hurt the Joker’s feelings by refusing to acknowledge that he was the caped crusader’s public enemy number one. It was all quite surreal.

Apart from the fact that everything and everyone was made out of Lego, there were some references to Batman in former times including an all-too-short scene featuring MY Batman, Adam West.

Now THAT Batman didn’t need a psychiatrist’s couch.

As I said: times have changed.

Technology has changed, too, which brings me to the second film I saw this week.

It was called Lion . I had never heard of it and the title gave nothing away but I went anyway, on the recommendation of my sister.

Wow!

We hear so much about how technology destroys lives. Social media leads to online bullying and trolling, kids spend all their lives staring at screens etc.

Lion showed a new way to use technology.

It tells the true story of a young Indian boy who becomes lost. He is eventually adopted by an Australian couple but longs to find the family who have missed him for 20 years.

He has no idea where he came from but eventually tracks down his remote rural village using Google Earth. It is a heart-wrenching but inspiring story.

I haven’t seen a film for weeks and last week I saw three.

Last week was Random Act of Kindness week when we were supposed to do something for someone just to make the world a happier place.

The third film I saw had random acts of kindness in it but mainly it was a film about a dystopian world in which people were left to starve or hounded to death by a totalitarian government that didn’t care.

The problem with this film was that it was not some imagined hell. It was I, Daniel Blake , directed by Ken Loach, who stood up at the Baftas and made an impassioned anti-government speech.

After seeing his film, I am not surprised.

It is set around a jobcentre and is based on a series of true stories from jobcentres in Scotland and England.

The central character, Daniel Blake, has worked all his life. He has a heart attack and is told by his specialist, doctor and physiotherapist that going back to work will kill him.

He tries to sign on but is refused because he is deemed fit for work.

I, like most of the audience, was moved to tears by his plight. But the overriding emotion we shared was frustrated anger.

We are the sixth largest economy in the world and yet we are failing the people who need us most – the sick, the old and those who need a hand from the government. Let’s face it, targeting the most vulnerable to save money by cutting benefits is obviously not working.

If I had written this column last year we would have been the fifth largest economy.

We are likely to be waking up to the result of the Copeland by- election this morning. I don’t care about the name of the winning candidate or party. I just pray that someone has been elected who will go to Westminster with compassion in their hearts and a zeal to fight for those who can’t fight for themselves.

Was Lego Batman a candidate?