WHISKY GALORE

One of the great joys of British cinema, "Whisky Galore" heralded the emergence of a great new talent in its director, Alexander Mackendrick and it's still one of the highlights in the Ealing canon. It was based on Compton MacKenzie's comic novel about a Scottish island that has run dry of 'the water of life', aka whisky, who suddenly finds itself blessed when a ship whose sole cargo is whisky runs aground off the island.

MacKenzie actually based his story on a real incident and Mackendrick filmed it on the island of Barra so it certainly looks authentic. It's also got a killer cast of some of the finest character actors in the movies headed by Basil Radford, Joan Greenwood, Gordon Jackson, Jean Cadell, (superb as Jackson's dragon of a mother), James Robertson Justice and 'Mr. Memory' himself, Wylie Watson. It was a huge hit, both here and in America where it was rechristened "Tight Little Island". Clearly influenced by Powell and Pressburger's "I Know Where I'm Going" and, in turn, a great influence on Bill Forsyth's "Local Hero". The recent remake isn't in the same class.