Ken Loach’s The Angels’ Share, which has just won the Jury Prize at Cannes, is part social realism, part comedy caper, and so good-natured, warm and affectionate it’s rather a joy, even though it doesn’t exactly add up; even though its climax is implausible, its tonal shifts are sometimes jarring, and it feels so familiar. It’s quite Bill Forsythian (with particular reference to his first ever feature, That Sinking Feeling, since you didn’t ask, but should have) via Whisky Galore! and The Full Monty.
Our hero is also familiar, as he’s one of those young men caught in a destructive cycle of violence, criminality and long-term unemployment rather than, say, a constructive cycle of cake-baking, helping old ladies across the road and embroidering antimacassars. Just thought it would be best to be clear about this. I do know how disappointing it is to go to the cinema with your heart set on a destructive cycle and getting a constructive cycle instead. It’s a bummer.
Anyway, written by Loach’s long-term collaborator Paul Laverty, a Scottish lawyer turned scriptwriter, this mostly stars first-timers and non-professionals, like Paul Brannigan. Brannigan, an ex-young offender himself, plays the central character, Robbie, a short-fused, wiry, intense Glasgow twenty-something caught in that cycle. (Honestly, he wouldn’t recognise an antimacassar if it walked up to him, put a hand on his arm and said, ‘Hello. I’m an antimacassar. Shall we go to the zoo?’)
Robbie has already done time. He can’t get a job. His family are at war with another local family, and have been for generations. Robbie wants to change, but his enemies warn him he will never be allowed. Yet his girlfriend, Leonie (Siobhan Reilly), is heavily pregnant, and he is, in fact, determined to mend his ways and become a good father — something a judge takes into account when Robbie is up in court for a vicious assault, and is given 300 hours on a ‘community payback’ scheme rather than a custodial sentence.
On the scheme, he meets fellow hoodlums Rhino (William Ruane), Mo (Jasmine Riggins), and the stupendously stupid Albert (Gary Maitland), as well as their kindly and compassionate supervisor, Harry (John Henshaw). Out of the goodness of his heart Harry, who is also a bit of a whisky connoisseur, takes them all on a day trip to a distillery, where they learn about ‘angels’ share’ — the percentage of whisky that evaporates during the maturing process — as well as a £1 million cask of a rare whisky due to be auctioned. Mustering his fellow offenders, Robbie comes up with a plan and, hopefully, a heist which will set them all up for life.
This is rather a joy, like I said, and is probably best taken as a film of small pleasures. Brannigan’s performance seems powerfully true, probably because it is, and John Henshaw is as wonderful as always and has some terrific lines. ‘Is there no shortbread in your house?’ he asks Albert, when Albert fails to recognise Edinburgh Castle. ‘You’re a Philippine,’ he tells Robbie, when Robbie fails to appreciate an excellent whisky.
And although I suppose this has a serious message — how can people be expected to change when they are denied any opportunities? How can young people feel they are of worth when there are no jobs? — it’s not weighed down by political dogma or any of Loach’s usual tragedian tendencies.
Instead, the second half is so larky and Bill Forsythian, it’s almost as if the brutality of the first half — Robbie getting a seeing-to from the gangster grandfather of his child; Robbie facing the victim of his own vicious assault — never happened. Tonally, this feels like a peculiar sidestep, plus I would also add that Robbie’s girlfriend, Leonie, who serves as an idealised emblem for fulfilled family life, seems rather naive for the daughter of a major thug. Just saying.
This is more successful than Loach’s other attempt at being light-hearted (the football-themed Looking for Eric) and although it won’t resonate down the years, it succeeds in the now by presenting characters you can properly care about, some laughs, and a feel-good ending, which doesn’t happen every day when it comes to films about the underclass. I’d go for it, if I were you, unless, of course, you are caught in a constructive cycle and are much too busy baking cakes.
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