Forty-two years on, Ken Loach's social-realist tragedy about a boy who trains a kestrel is still transcendentally powerful
Ken Loach's social-realist tragedy from 1969 looks more luminous, more impassioned than ever, a rich film of flesh and blood. Perhaps, 42 years on, now is the time to restore the co-authorial status of Barry Hines, who adapted his own novel and gave Loach such a great story to work with. Non-professional David Bradley plays Billy Casper, the lad with the unforgettably pinched, shrewd, hungry face at the Barnsley comp where brutal teachers cane kids for things they haven't done. The poster famously shows Billy flicking a V-sign, but that's something he never does in the film, his defiance being more complex. Billy discovers a wild kestrel and realises he can train it: like a Tudor emblem of underdog ambition and power. The scene where Colin Welland's kindly teacher coaxes him...
Ken Loach's social-realist tragedy from 1969 looks more luminous, more impassioned than ever, a rich film of flesh and blood. Perhaps, 42 years on, now is the time to restore the co-authorial status of Barry Hines, who adapted his own novel and gave Loach such a great story to work with. Non-professional David Bradley plays Billy Casper, the lad with the unforgettably pinched, shrewd, hungry face at the Barnsley comp where brutal teachers cane kids for things they haven't done. The poster famously shows Billy flicking a V-sign, but that's something he never does in the film, his defiance being more complex. Billy discovers a wild kestrel and realises he can train it: like a Tudor emblem of underdog ambition and power. The scene where Colin Welland's kindly teacher coaxes him...
- 9/8/2011
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
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