Soft Top, Hard Shoulder

Yet another Scottish road movie with a quick wave towards Bill Forsyth. OK, so Restless Natives was more of a v-sign but Soft Top, Hard Shoulder, scripted by Peter Capaldi, is just a little tod obvious in its sycophancy to the father of the Scottish film industry.

Gavin (Capaldi) stands to inherit a chunk of an ice-cream empire - shades of Comfort and Joy? - if he can make it back to Glesca in a knackered Triumph convertible in time for his father's sixtieth birthday. But on the way he picks up a sporran-head of a hitchhiken he looses his wallet the car breaks down....and if you've seen It Happened One Night you have a fair idea of how everythimg unfolds.

Gavin makes an annoying hero and the ending is unconvincing, but the plot defects are made up for in the quirky dialogue, the one-liners - "Any friend of Gavin's is a bad judge of character" - and the ensemble cast made up of Capaldi's best mates, Richard Wilson, Frances Barber, Phyllis Logan; and his wife Elaine Collins. There are also those little nods towards the film's generic brethren, The purple Volkswagen borrowed from Duel, the use of cinemascope, etc. that make it so damn endearing. Add this to a Chris Rea soundtrack with open-top motoring stamped all over it and you have yourself a gem of a film.

Review by Stephen Cox
Taken from EUFS Programme 1994-95