The Angels' Share

+The Angels’ Share (+Ken Loach, 2012, 101 min)

  After over 40 years of making Lefty political films, it’s not surprising that when Ken Loach makes a heist comedy it should have a constructive social edge to it.

The language poses some challenges. I could make out the “****," "****,” and “whiskey.” The other 75% of the dialogue was incomprehensible. 

But you can piece together the plot easily enough. A group of hapless Scottish thugs, thieves and all-round losers meet to do their community service time. One, Robbie (Paul Brannigan), gets the idea of tapping off some of a rare whiskey coming up for auction. From the million pound cask he sells a bottle for 100 grand and a job with a distiller. 

The title refers to the evaporation that the distilleries call “the angels’ share.” These little devils make off with it themselves. Robbie is newly driven to improve himself by the birth of a son and the introduction to fine whiskey that his public service supervisor gives him.

This is Loach’s political point. The hapless on the lowest rung of the social ladder may well be as gifted as the toffs are. Robbie turns out to have a rare nose and palate for the spirits. This prompts him to the heist, which enables him to move his wife and infant away from her uncles who want to kill him and her father who tries to buy him off. 

How egalitarian is Loach? It’s not just the scum Robbie who can acquire taste. A wealthy American can too. Or at least win the absurdly expensive auction.

So the film’s theme is the need to develop social mobility. As Robbie’s wife cradles their perfect infant she says the child is half complete. The other half is for them to cultivate. 

That’s the point of the film’s most disgusting scene. At the young thieves’ whiskey tasting they spit the spirits into a tub, to which one adds a gob or two. That bloke is so desperate for a drink that he then scarfs the swill. From that low point Robbie will lead the group to the possibility of improvement.

Loach isn’t dreamy enough to expect a general elevation. Robbie uses the heist loot to move his family out of his turgid trap, to a new career in the city. But his colleagues count their share, then resolve immediately to “get wasted.” But because a social worker helped him out, Robbie discovers his gift and breaks out of the vicious cycle of his slum life. In casting only first-time actors Loach performs and proves that same magic himself.