PRIDE
Director: Matthew Warchus
Cast: Ben Schnetzer, George MacKay, Andrew Scott, Joseph Gilgun, Faye Marsay, Freddie Fox, Dominic West, Joshua Hill, Chris Overton, Paddy Considine,
Imelda Staunton, Menna Trussler, Jessica Gunning, Lisa Palfrey, Bill Nighy, Sophie Evans
Rating: (M)
Pride (Rialto, Metro and Reading) is a totally different style of movie. There are numerous lead actors playing charismatic roles but everyone is in a supporting role because this is a film about the meeting of two groups in a common cause.
The year is 1984 and the British coal miners are on strike. In London it is the annual Gay Pride march and the community is feeling frisky as the police are too busy arresting striking miners to bother with them.
But natural-born leader Mark Ashton (Ben Schnetzer) has an epiphany as he gets ready for the march. On the principle that my enemy's enemy is my friend he decides that the miners are the cause he should be supporting.
The LGSM (Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners) is just a handful of friends with buckets but they soon have a handy sum to donate to the cause. The only problem is finding a miner's group willing to accept money from them.
Over in the Welsh valleys the townspeople of Onllwyn are sticking together just as they always have. When the phone rings with the offer of money they take it and then their natural sense of hospitality kicks in.
They have hosted every other group which has supported them and the LGSM has given them the most so they have to invite them over but how will everyone react?
With much trepidation on both sides a visit is arranged and the touching sympathy between the two very different groups begins. Pride is a feel-good movie that makes you really feel good because it actually happened.
- Reviewed by Christine Powley
