Ken Loach has the heart in the right place but his films are a mixed bag: some are extremely good, while others follow the boring blueprints of film-making. The Angels' Share is small film, I suppose the budget was very modest. It's not a perfect film by any means, but it did entertain me - and I suspect that it would be difficult for a film about the working class and single malt whisky to disappoint me, given my political leanings and my appreciation for the water of life. The film is set in Glasgow: youth unemployment, crime, poverty - but it is also a film about people who come to care about one another. The story revolves around Robbie, who dodges doing time in jail as he agrees to community service under the supervision of one sympathetic man, Harry, who also happens to be a whisky connoisseur. The fact that the film constantly shifts gears - from social commentary to relationship drama to heist comedy - doesn't really irritate me; actually, I think Loach makes a pretty good job in keeping this rather loose thing together. It's not Hamlet, but I grew to like the characters, I cared for them and the strange scenes involving whisky expertise and glaswegian unemployed youth amused me a great deal. The humor in the film does not feel patronizing. Instead of sentimentalizing the working class, Loach takes a piss with images of Culture and Great Taste, wringing them in a direction that feels quite fresh.- - - As one reviewer put it: Angels' share and its gallery of characters is almost as far as one gets from the cool, elegant atmosphere in a George Clooney heist movie. A sympathetic movie.
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