In Ken Loach's touching Sweet Sixteen, an empty trailer overlooking the Firth of Cyde in the depressed, Scottish town of Greenrock looks like the key to a better life to 15-year old Liam. First-time actor Martin Compston, a professional soccer player from the Greenrock area picked by Loach from a high school audition, holds the film together with a truly convincing performance as the good-natured teenager who has excellent motives but lacks the ability to realize them in socially acceptable ways. Shot in cinema-verité documentary style, Loach avoids hand-held camera tricks and special effects to deliver a film that feels effortless and totally natural. Though bleak, it is a work of tenderness and compassion that contains wee touches of humor.
A high school dropout, Liam is waiting for his heroin-addicted mother Jean (Michelle Coulter) to be released from prison so he can surprise her with a decent place to live. Framed by her drug-dealing boyfriend Stan (Gary McCormack), Liam is determined to make sure that his mother will not have to go back to Stan when she is released. Unfortunately, he cannot raise enough money for the down payment on the house by selling black market cigarettes in pubs with his best friend Pinball (William Ruane), so he resorts to stealing gear (drugs) from Stan with predictable consequences. After Stan and his buddies beat him up, Liam moves in with his sister, Chantelle (AnnMarie Fulton), and her young son, Calum (Calum McAlees). Chantelle wants nothing to do with her mother and warns Liam to steer clear of her as well but he asks her to give their mom a second chance.
As his sister nurses his wounds, she tells him of the times he stood up to his tormentors in a children's home: "You didn't fight them because you were brave; you fought them because you didn't care what happened to you. That's what broke my heart". It is only a short time later that his exploits on the street are singled out for praise by the local professional syndicate and he accepts their offer to supply the drugs for him. "An opportunity like this for someone like you comes only once," one of the mobsters tells him. When Liam delivers drugs by hitching a ride on the mopeds of friendly pizza delivery boys, crime boss Tony (Martin McCardie) is so impressed with his ingenuity that he buys the pizza shop and offers him an apartment for Liam's mother.
While Liam gains our sympathy with his gritty toughness, it is only a matter of time before he finds himself so deep in a hole that he has nowhere to turn. With a great screenplay by Paul Laverty, Sweet Sixteen is one of Loach's most powerful works, a film that sadly suggests that in a country where almost one in three children are living in poverty, some see crime as the only available option. Despite a clichéd ending that strikes a false note, Liam's transcendent spirit makes Sweet Sixteen rise far above the ordinary.
A high school dropout, Liam is waiting for his heroin-addicted mother Jean (Michelle Coulter) to be released from prison so he can surprise her with a decent place to live. Framed by her drug-dealing boyfriend Stan (Gary McCormack), Liam is determined to make sure that his mother will not have to go back to Stan when she is released. Unfortunately, he cannot raise enough money for the down payment on the house by selling black market cigarettes in pubs with his best friend Pinball (William Ruane), so he resorts to stealing gear (drugs) from Stan with predictable consequences. After Stan and his buddies beat him up, Liam moves in with his sister, Chantelle (AnnMarie Fulton), and her young son, Calum (Calum McAlees). Chantelle wants nothing to do with her mother and warns Liam to steer clear of her as well but he asks her to give their mom a second chance.
As his sister nurses his wounds, she tells him of the times he stood up to his tormentors in a children's home: "You didn't fight them because you were brave; you fought them because you didn't care what happened to you. That's what broke my heart". It is only a short time later that his exploits on the street are singled out for praise by the local professional syndicate and he accepts their offer to supply the drugs for him. "An opportunity like this for someone like you comes only once," one of the mobsters tells him. When Liam delivers drugs by hitching a ride on the mopeds of friendly pizza delivery boys, crime boss Tony (Martin McCardie) is so impressed with his ingenuity that he buys the pizza shop and offers him an apartment for Liam's mother.
While Liam gains our sympathy with his gritty toughness, it is only a matter of time before he finds himself so deep in a hole that he has nowhere to turn. With a great screenplay by Paul Laverty, Sweet Sixteen is one of Loach's most powerful works, a film that sadly suggests that in a country where almost one in three children are living in poverty, some see crime as the only available option. Despite a clichéd ending that strikes a false note, Liam's transcendent spirit makes Sweet Sixteen rise far above the ordinary.