‘In those days,’ Tom Shields noted in Gormley’s
obituary in The Guardian, ‘the Scottish film industry could fit into the snug
of the Halt bar in Glasgow’s Woodlands Road and, indeed, was often to be found there.’*
Even for those of us not old enough to go to the flickers
at the time, it will be all too easy to appreciate the hand-to-mouth nature of
British Cinema in the eighties, some good, Channel Four for instance, much bad,
with so many bright younger filmmakers not being able to sustain a career for
which most roads still led to Hollywood and unforgiving metrics. This film was
Charles Gormley’s second after Living Apart Together (1982) which featured the
multi-talented BA Robertson (who provides this film's score) and some young
fella, a part-time musician called Peter Capaldi.
So much Scottish talent at this time, as always, and in
it’s own way Heavenly Pursuits, gives some the chance to shine,
including young Ewen Bremner as Stevie Deans a pupil with special needs who
appears unreachable by normal teaching methods and cameos from stalwarts such
as Ron Donachie and Jake D'Arcy in a pub no less… There’s also much local charm
in the humour even among the classroom kids, non-professionals including Bremner,
picked for looks and their ability to react in just the right way.
In the seventies, Gormley had co-founded the Glasgow
production company Tree Fims in partnership with another aspirant filmmaker,
Bill Forsyth and this film carries something of the latter’s charm, partly
local but also in the form of the indomitably affable Tom Conti who breezes
through this story with all the mumbling bemusement and deceptively
naturalistic ease you’d expect. He plays Vic Mathews a disaffected but
determined teacher convinced that his school could be better run, he can’t
really change it but that he will and must help those children who are falling
behind the majority of neuro-typical pupils.
Even in the 80s, Special Needs was only just being
understood and legislated for, with inclusion a key part of the strategies.
Stevie Deans is in danger of being sent to a “special school” which – in Vic’s
mind, will mark him for life. Vic teachers the Remedial Class, which we had in
my comprehensive and from which half the members of legendary Scouse band Echo
and the Bunnymen were members – I can recommend guitarist Will Sergeant’s two
volume biography, not so much remedial as exceptional! I know little of the
Scottish educational system at the time but ten years later in England, SEN
were rather more supportive outside of mainstream schools although this is less
the case in the 2020s. You have to get lucky, you need something close to a
miracle…
Talking of which… the school is Catholic and is searching
for two more miracles that would promote the late Edith Semple from Blessed to
sainthood. The story begins with the school’s pastor, Father Cobb (Brian
Pettifer, simply in everything in those days) on a trip to the Vatican only to
have the proposed miracles not being quite miraculous enough. Never the less,
Father Cobb keeps praying for more and especially that pupil little Alice
McKenzie may be able to walk again.
Vic, like his friend and science teacher colleague Jeff
Jeffries (David Hayman), don’t believe in the miracles promised for simpler
minds but strange things begin to happen firstly when Vic’s record player plays
without its socket been plugged in or switched on and then, more importantly he
finally get Stevie to connect to maths through the use of betting odds and
returns. There’s further evidence when talking about the hardest languages the
young man pipes up with the names of motorcycle companies which Vic quickly
recognises is a game of two-wheeled Top Trumps. Has he found the key or is this
another of the miracles the school seeks?
Things start to affect Vic personally as he is diagnosed
with terminal brain cancer but only finds out after falling three-four storeys
trying to rescue a pupil on a roof only to emerge unscathed and with no sign of
the fatal shadow on his x-ray. By this point he has begun a relationship with a
new music teacher Ruth Chancellor (Helen Mirren) who is a practicing Catholic
but, like him unsure of miracles. Mirren and Conti are generational talents and
their relationship is worth the price of admission on its own.
Then Alice McKenzie starts to walk and miracle mania
starts to run as things reach fever pitch… The oddest thing, as Kemp notes, is
that those you’d think would want to take credit for miracles seem to be the
keenest to suppress them, from the Vatican, the Bishop and even the Hospital
where Vic’s miracle is observed…
In The Washington Post, Rita Kempley praised the
film as a ‘sweet-natured and idiosyncratic work, written and directed by
former [Bill] Forsyth associate Charles Gormley. His style is derivative but
his scriptwriting is inspired ... There’s always room for doubt in this
delightfully quirky screenplay, with its grumbling atheists and gosh-almighty
faithful.’
There is indeed always room for doubt but in the end the
miracle is that we keep on keeping on and trying all the same, making miracles
happen as best we can and not waiting for them to save us.
Special features
- Illustrated booklet with a new essay on the film by Philip Kemp, biographies of Tom Conti and Helen Mirren by Ellen Cheshire, notes on the special features and credits. First pressing only!
- Presented in High Definition
- A Magic Touch (2024, 20 mins): Tom Conti looks back upon the making of Heavenly Pursuits in this interview recorded especially for this release
- The Mirocle (1976, 13 mins): a man attempts to escape from his own ego, but to no avail – until a mysterious mirror appears, inviting him to look within himself. Stylish animation influenced by the work of Paul Klee
- The Science of Miracles (1897-1943, 18 mins): feast your eyes on some startling scientific marvels – and wonder upon the peculiar power of X-ray photography – as you examine these rare films from the vaults of the BFI National Archive
- Original trailer
Heavenly Pursuits is out now and can be ordered direct from the BFI online or in person on the Southbank: divinely charming!
*Quoted by Philip Kemp in his booklet essay.
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