Compared to The Big Flame, which covers not dissimilar ground, this is a sober, unblinking treatment, eliminating the flourishes of his 60s work. It recreates the smoke-filled rooms and committee discussions, establishing that the unions and management are both conspiring to shore up a system that keeps the ordinary workers in their place. Loach’s mature, unadorned style emerged with this account of a labour dispute in north-west England, a BBC Play for Today that is essentially a lightly fictionalised treatment of the 1970 Pilkington glass strike. There’s not much light and shade here: Gralton (Barry Ward) is your standard crinkle-eyed nice-guy, a sacrificial lamb to the republic’s new intolerance. Jimmy’s Hall (2014)Īn uncomplicated, comfort-zone paean to the Irish communist Jimmy Gralton, whose brand of free-thinking is too much for the local worthies in 1930s Ireland. Photograph: Sportsphoto Ltd/Allstar/C4 29. Robert Carlyle and Oyanka Cabezas in Carla’s Song.
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The involvement of Robert Carlyle, fresh from Trainspotting, gave this film a shot in the arm, although the somewhat saucer-eyed approach to the Latin characters – particularly Carla herself, with whose exotic mystery Carlyle’s bus driver falls in love – doesn’t do the film many favours. You can see the attraction of the Nicaraguan civil war: one of the great international causes of the 80s. Nevertheless, this was evidence that Loach had achieved what he had clearly been aiming at for some time: acting so planed down it was indistinguishable from reality. Loach really nailed his political colours to the mast with this script by the Trotskyist former docker Jim Allen, and in doing so proved that the intricacies of an industrial dispute could be material for compelling, if not exactly exhilarating, drama.
In truth, it doesn’t amount to all that much, but texturally it’s still pretty interesting. Loach (as ever) is more interested in the fans and how football folds into their lives (more good work from Ken Jones), with real-life footage of Everton personnel (including Young) talking to camera about their lives. This innovative mix of drama and documentary pleasingly focuses on a cult figure from Everton’s mid-60s cup-winning side: the Scottish midfielder Alex Young. Loach may not be an obvious football man, but it’s a thread that runs through his work.
It’s a bit on the stagey side, with lots of cockney chat, but the final execution scene, when poor Tony Selby is strung up for killing a prison officer, still packs a hell of a punch. A talky, digressive piece, this anti-death penalty broadside is infused with a jittery hyperactive energy as Loach sought to overcome the staid traditions of television drama.
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The earliest of Loach’s Wednesday Plays to survive shows his early style in full flow. It’s a clever idea – train tickets as a symbol for wider social permissions – and Loach’s bit is nice but slight, with a bunch of Celtic fans squabbling among themselves whether to help an Albanian migrant family. Tickets (2005)Īnother package film, with Loach directing the final third after chunks from Ermanno Olmi (The Tree of Wooden Clogs) and Abbas Kiarostami. Gerulf Pannach and Fabienne Babe in Fatherland.
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