Riff-Raff (1991) Robert Carlyle, Emer McCourt, Jim R. Coleman, George Moss, Ricky Tomlinson Movie Review

Riff-Raff (1991)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Emer McCourt and Robert Carlyle in Riff-Raff (1991)

A Love Labourer

Having done time young Glaswegian Stevie (Robert Carlyle) has headed to London where he has found work as a labourer a demolition crew working for a penny pinching boss. Fortunately the guys he works with know what it is like and help Stevie finds an abandoned flat to squat in. It is whilst at work filling up a skip he finds a handbag and returns it to its owner, would-be singer Susan (Emer McCourt) who is struggling financially as well. It leads to them becoming involved but with Susan having a drug problem combined with health and safety issues at work things do not run smoothly.

"Riff-Raff" is Ken Loach doing romantic comedy but set against a more typical social commentary set up, which if that sounds awkward it kind of is as for me they are not good bed fellows. But if you take them separately then they work with plenty of social commentary with Ricky Tomlinson playing a union leader who bemoans how the country is under Thatcher with services taken from the workers and how people are homeless. If you are use to these early 90s and 80s social commentary movies which take a swipe at Tory Britain this one is sure to entertain. But then you have the romantic comedy and it would be fair to say that Loach's approach to romantic comedy whilst at times traditional has a more grounded feel to it which works but is an acquired taste which to be truth isn't mine. But then to be honest "Riff-Raff" is as a whole an acquired taste even more so now a quarter of a century later.

What this all boils down to is that whilst "Riff-Raff" is at times quite sweet when it comes to the romance the rest of the movie with its social commentary on a Tory Britain is an acquired taste which didn't quite work for me in conjunction with the romantic comedy side of the movie.


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