A grand tour of Scotland, with absolutely no swearing involved - Susan Morrison
When I was a kid I heard my mum say, “If you can't say anything nice about something, then don't say anything at all”. It was right before she, Mrs Martin and Mrs Millar savaged the reputation of Mrs Heggarty, who was apparently “no better than she should be”.
In the spirit of the first statement, I shall maintain a diplomatic silence around the film Glenrothan, our cinematic treat last weekend.
It’s got a great cast. Brian Cox directs and stars in full-on cuddly uncle mode, which must make a nice change from his recent full-on roaring sweary media monster mode.
Though I think I preferred the sweary monster. No-one swears quite like Brian Cox. It’s almost a superpower. The full fury of a four-letter word blast from Hurricane Cox was something to behold when withering his on-screen Succession family.
Alan Cumming is in it as well. I am fond of Mr Cumming, but he doesn’t swear as well as Mr Cox. In real life, I mean.
But foul language does not feature in this film. This is family fare. It’s as cosy as a long-running BBC drama about midwives. So cosy, in fact, that it makes any CBeebies production look like Godzilla v King Kong.
It’s about two brothers and a distillery, and it’s actually filmed in Scotland, so that’s a bonus. Least we forget, in Braveheart it wasn’t just Mel Gibson’s accent that wandered about. Stirling Bridge, scene of one of Wallace’s great victories, apparently did a runner before filming commenced and was notably missing. Probably in a huff, since, according to Hollywood, Stirling was in County Meath, in Ireland.
Highlander did better. We got Eilean Donan Castle, Glencoe and Glennfinnan, all anchored by Sir Sean Connery’s rock-solid Edinburgh accent – even though he was playing an Egyptian Spaniard who had lived in Japan for a long time. Well, he was meant to be immortal. He gets to choose whatever accent he wants, so naturally he chose Scotland.
Mind you, seeing Scotland on screen is always distracting for Scots. Playing “spot the location” means you can lose the plot. It’s entirely possible that by bickering over the potential location of one scene we missed Cox and Cumming taking down a violent organised crime family in a running gun battle past the chip shop in a village we thought was Kinross, but which turned out to be Gartmore.
We got to see a lot of Scotland on the route to Glenrothan being mildly eccentric. You leave Edinburgh Airport, head north over the Queensferry Crossing, turn left to pass the Kelpies and then a quick dash across what looked like the Connel Bridge, by Oban. That’ll take you right to the door of the distillery, which I pretty much nailed as Falkirk.
There are two possible explanations for this circuitous and scenic route. One, Scottish screen satnav needs updating, or two, I am driving, and I thought we were heading to Moffat.
The film may have had its weaknesses, but Scotland looked bonny enough to have VisitScotland wiping away tears of joy and gratitude. Gartmore has its own wee spot on the tourist map now, courtesy of Brian Cox, their new local hero – which is also the title of the greatest Scottish film ever made.
I’ll fight you outside in the carpark over that one. If I can find it…