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MovieMail's Review
Those familiar with George Orwell's ‘Homage to Catalonia’ will recognise the Internationalist spirit in which this engrossing Spanish Civil War movie was made. But much has changed in the decade since Ken Loach and screenwriter Jim Allen paid tribute to the ordinary Joes from around the world who took up arms against the Fascist forces threatening the fragile peace of Europe in the mid-1930s.
For starters, the collapse of Communism was still fresh in the minds of the audiences watching unemployed Scouse activist Ian Hart leave behind the Depression to pursue the romantic dream of sustaining a socialist state against the twin scourges of privilege and religion. So, there was still a nostalgic yearning among many left-wingers for the egalitarian Bolshevism that many feel was denied a chance of global revolutionary triumph by the murderous excesses of Stalinism. Moreover, Hart's avowal of anti-establishment rhetoric was also filmed during the 16th year of Conservative rule in Britain, when no one had yet become disenchanted with the shiny optimistic `things can only get better' credo of New Labour. Furthermore, the notion of the ‘just crusade’ was still viable before it came to be so vociferously questioned before the Bush-Blair invasion of Iraq.
Land and Freedom has itself now become a historical document and is
therefore probably more valuable now than on its original release. The passion and fierce intelligence of its dialectical debates stand in stark contrast to the current antipathy to most things political, while its sympathy for cross-border communalism clashes with the Euro scepticism and terrorist-inspired xenophobia that dominate the contemporary agenda. Its DVD release in the run-up to a General Election couldn't be better timed. But it also stands as one of Loach's most committed, contentious and courageous projects.
Larger in scope than any previous Loach film and the Spanish Civil war sequences have an authenticity often lacking in popular entertainment movies. The subject may be historical, but there's not a hint of 'heritage'. Jim Allen's screenplay connects the political education of Ian Hart's Liverpudlian volunteer with that of his 1990s granddaughter.
Larger in scope than any previous Loach film. The Spanish Civil war sequences have an authenticity often lacking in popular entertainment movies. The subject may be hi... more >
Larger in scope than any previous Loach film. The Spanish Civil war sequences have an authenticity often lacking in popular entertainment movies. The subject may be historical, but there's not a hint of "heritage", Jim Allen's screenplay connecting the political education of Ian Hart's Liverpudlian volunteer with that of his 1990s granddaughter. < less
