1999-11-12
N/A
94 min
James Gillespie is 12 years old. The world he knew is changing. Haunted by a secret, he has become a stranger in his own family. He is drawn to the canal where he creates a world of his own. He finds an awkward tenderness with Margaret Anne, a vulnerable 14 year old expressing a need for love in all the wrong ways, and befriends Kenny, who possesses an unusual innocence in spite of the harsh surroundings.
It was quite odd watching this because I was just a little younger than the character of "James" (William Eadie) living in Glasgow in the 1970s. I remember the nine-week long dustmen strike that left tons of rubbish piled up all over the place. We lived in a mouse-infested one bed flat similar to the ones in the tenement buildings featured here, and that canal - well it was an overgrown, disease-ridden, deathtrap that had long been abandoned to nature. Back then, there was still ample waste ground - bomb damaged and cleared after the war, for us kids to play on, and that's what we did. Nobody had a car or a phone - or, for that matter, a washing machine, so when he goes out to play no wonder he was meant to tuck his trouser legs into his wellies! Mind you, I'd have thought the canal way too cold for him and his mate "Ryan" (Thomas McTaggart) to be be mucking around in, but that is what they are doing when tragedy strikes. It's this that forms the bedrock for this engagingly observational story of him and his life with his drunk of a father (Tommy Flanagan); caring, but no-nonsense mother (Mandy Matthews) and young sister. The photography powerfully depicts the squalor in which they live, ever hopeful that the folks from the council are going to come and offer them a new home on the city's outskirts where "James" dreams of having a real plumbed bath and a field of corn to play in. He also befriends "Margaret Anne" (Leanne Mullen), a slightly older girl who spends much of her time giving his mates their first semi-sexual experiences in her flat or in the cludgie. Alone else remember the "nit comb"? That actually proves to be the most unlikely of romantic conduits as the two use that and a hefty dose of eye-watering carbolic soap to discover a bond, a companionship, and some genuine moments of affection. Eadie is great here, he delivers in a most natural of styles and aided by Flanagan as his permanently sozzled but never violent father, by Matthews and by the remarkably engaging effort from his "retarded" neighbour "Kenny" (John Miller), presents us with a sense of a family and a community that certainly speaks most of the time in swear words, but still has standards of decency and a strong sense of looking out for each other. We were never a community that showed affection in any sentimental sense and with virtually no technology to rely on, we made our own entertainment - however grubby and dangerous it might look nowadays. Lynne Ramsay portrays that gritty urban living potently and plausibly here whilst remembering that this city is also populated by some of the most entertainingly sarcastic people on Earth. The "schemes" of Glasgow were nowhere to to live in 1973, but everyone was in the same boat - and that is really effectively demonstrated in this poignant search for hope, freedom and some hot water.
