Starring: George MacKay, Kevin Guthrie, Jane Horrocks
Having served a tour of duty in the army, friends Davy (MacKay) and Ally (Guthrie) return home to Edinburgh where Ally plans to propose to Davy's sister, Liz (Freya Mavor) and Davy romances Liz's English friend, Yvonne (Antonia Thomas). Meanwhile, Davy's father, Rab (Peter Mullan) gets in touch with his daughter (Emma-Hartley Miller) from an affair and puts his marriage with wife, Jean (Horrocks) in jeopardy.
Given the massive success of Mama Mia! (2007), the film adaptation if a musical based on the work of ABBA, it seemed inevitable that other adaptations of "jukebox musicals" would come along. Frankly, however, few would've expected a film based around the songs of the very Scottish musical duo, The Proclaimers. It's this oddity in both premise and execution however, that makes it entertaining. The film definitely owes a debt to Mama Mia! but has a little bit of a tighter focus on drama, with death being a surprisingly recurring theme, and the many Proclaimers songs ((I'm Gonna Be) 500 Miles, Letter From America, Let's Get Married etc.) are given more of a show-tune feel, pushing out the quirky folk-inflected nature of the original material. However, counter-acting this most of the cast deliver the songs in noticeable Scottish accents and, like Mama Mia!, there's a sense of a pub singalong rather than a West End production (save for Antonia Thomas).
The narrative allows the strong lyrical skills if The Proclaimers to shine through, although the plot is messy, unclear and contrived even by the standards of a musical, it often feels like the plot is just a loose means to tie the different musical numbers together, with some numbers being almost tangential in nature. Actor turned director Dexter Fletcher (who made his screen debut in 1976 in the minor role of Baby Face in another eccentric British musical, Bugsy Malone) pulls in some interesting stylistic twists (crowd scenes and dance routines that seem like a large number of he extras were just members of the general public joining in) but does't quite take the film beyond a generic and slightly bland cuddliness. For all that it's completely inoffensive and safe, and is about as Scottish as a deep-fried Loch Ness Monster eating haggis whilst wearing tartan to the sound of bagpipes, when it's over and done with, Sunshine On Leith is enjoyable in its self-aware goofiness much like the music it represents.
Next time, Saosire Ronan stars as a girl fighting for survival following a nuclear attack in How I Live Now.
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