The Old Oak explores the struggle to maintain hope and solidarity in working-class communities. Margaret Petrie reviews Ken Loach’s latest film. The Old Oak (currently showing on Netflix) is the third in a trilogy of films set in the Northeast of England from Director Ken Loach and Scriptwriter Paul Laverty. All three films give voice […]
The problem is not filmmakers’ motivations but the commercial priorities of the industry and the scarcity of funding to tell Scottish stories, finds Rory MacNeish. The relocation of Alasdair Gray’s novel Poor Things from Glasgow to London in Yorgos Lanthimos’s screen adaptation prompted much griping. “For many, it will be like watching The Lord of […]
Five years ago, on 7th April 2019, the Jewish Labour Movement passed a no-confidence motion on Jeremy Corbyn, adding to charges of anti-semitism that fuelled the Labour right’s anti-Corbyn campaign. Oh Jeremy Corbyn: the Big Lie shows how the allegations destroyed Corbyn’s socialist project, finds Bill Bonnar. Oh, Jeremy Corbyn; the Big Lie did the […]
Maura Finkelstein reviews [...] by Fady Joudah (Outspoken Press, 2024).
A new collaborative research project and resource base will support trade unionists as they divest from the Israeli arms trade. By the Editors of New Socialist and Cailean Gallagher. First published on New Socialist. Many of the bombs being dropped on Gaza are being dropped from drones made by unionised workers in Britain. The missile […]
Henry Roberts explains how wealthy investors are ridding St Andrews of its cultural spaces. Justin Timberlake and Tiger Woods recently announced plans to open a high-end US-style sports bar in St Andrews, the golf capital of the world. What has angered both students and residents is that the bar’s proposed site is the beloved cinema […]
Palestine Action is a direct action network targeting British complicity in Israeli apartheid. We spoke to its co-founder Huda Ammori in September 2023. On 14th October, a day of Palestine solidarity demonstrations across the world, PA activists sprayed the BBC’s London HQ in red paint, ‘symbolising their complicity in Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people’. PA is calling for people […]
⭐⭐⭐ A mixture of spoken word, storytelling and jazz/soul, A Portrait of Ludmilla as Nina Simone is an uplifting but candid account of Simone’s life and legacy. Ludmila Dabo retells the story of Nina’s early life and the brutality of her treatment by various partners, and these challenging references offer some glimpses into the inner world of […]
In The Collie’s Shed, a multi-generation cast of actors portray the past and present lives of four men whose lives were fundamentally changed by the 1985 miners’ strike. Told from the perspective of those who stood proudly and defiantly on the picket lines and of those who walked past it, some reluctantly and others less so, […]
⭐⭐⭐⭐ Cyriel Buysee’s 1903 Flemish classic The Van Paemel Family is a compelling story of class struggle. It is lovingly portrayed by Valentin Dhaenens, and the humour and warmth of his character acting keeps you engrossed throughout. Dhaenens is a one-man army (literally) and he offers a tour-de-force of character acting as he interacts with the entire […]