Cannes festival: Ken Loach’s Glasgow tale takes Jury Prize

A TALE of whisky and redemption won one of the top prizes at the Cannes film festival last night.The Angels’ Share, a film about unemployed Glaswegians directed by Ken Loach, won the coveted Jury Prize at the film festival.

Loach said the prize for his darkly comic film proved that “cinema is not just an entertainment. It shows us who we are”.

The comedy, written by Paul Laverty, stars Paul Brannigan, 25, a former young offender who was discovered while working as a volunteer football coach in Glasgow. He plays the central figure of Robbie in the film.

Brannigan, who is still not sure he wants to pursue a career as an actor, said in an interview earlier this week: “Hands up, I would say that Paul has saved my life.

“I had nowhere to turn, I’ve got a kid – who knows what I would have done for money.

“I’m very familiar with the situation in this film. My background was quite rough. But, in all honesty, there are thousands and thousands of kids like Robbie, with the same story.”

The Jury Prize is awarded to the third-placed film at the international movie showcase on the French Riviera.

The film tells the story of a group of unemployed Glaswegians who discover a taste for fine whisky.

The angels’ share is a distiller’s expression that refers to the portion of the whisky that evaporates through the wood of the cask before it is bottled.

Brannigan, who had no previous acting experience, has already earned himself a small part in an alien movie, Under The Skin, also filmed in Scotland, which stars Scarlett Johanssen.

Brannigan, who has met justice minister Kenny Macaskill to share his experiences as a young offender, will attend the premiere of The Angel’s Share in Glasgow Cineworld on Tuesday next week.

US movies were trumped by European films at the awards last night, after a week that saw unseasonably chilly weather in the south of France.

The top prize, the Palm d’Or, was won for the second time by Michael Haneka, with Amour, his stark film about love and death.

The Austrian director’s powerful and understated film stars two French acting icons – 85-year-old Emmanuelle Riva and Jean-Louis Trintignant, 81 – as an elderly couple coping with the wife’s worsening health.

Haneke won Cannes’ top prize in 2009 for The White Ribbon.

The festival jury awarded the second-place Grand Prize to Italian director Matteo Garrone’s satire Reality, the story of a Naples fishmonger obsessed with reality TV. Carlos Reygadas was named best director for his surrealism-tinged story of a Mexican family, Post Tenebras Lux.

Acting prizes went to Mads Mikkelsen as a man ostracised by his small-town community when he is accused of child abuse in The Hunt, and jointly to Cristina Flutur and Cosmina Stratan for Romanian movie Beyond the Hills.

The winners were chosen by a jury led by director Nanni Moretti, that included actors Ewan McGregor and Diane Kruger, director Alexander Payne and fashion designer Jean-Paul Gaultier.