Ken Loach's Best Film

I definitely have it in the mix for sure, I think it's been his most sadly neglected of his films. No remastered DVD or Blu Ray release, get Criterion Collection to release this masterpiece. Make a great double bill with Loach's other masterpiece about civil war The Wind That Shakes The Barkley (2006).

The underrated Ian Hart is great as the Liverpool Communist who travels to Spain to fight agaisnt Facists and joins up with a small group called POUM in 1936, to fight in the Spanish Civil War. Also great performance from Rosana Pastor as Blanca, the woman Hart's character falls in love with (she's now a politician). Also performances from Iciar Bollain (a director herself now and wrote a book on Ken Loach) and she met her partner in real life Paul Laverty on this film, who went on to become Loach's main screenwriter after this (he didn't write Land and Freedom) and Frederic Pierrot.

I definitely put this in top grade Loach with the likes of Kes, Sweet Sixteen, My Name Is Joe, Raining Stones, Ladybird Ladybird, The Wind That Shakes The Barley I, Daniel Blake and Riff Raff.