91% The Angels' Share

All Critics (66) | Top Critics (17) | Fresh (60) | Rotten (6)

The plot thickens, but the mood grows lighter.

Unexpectedly, and blithely, amusing.

The film itself vaporizes before your eyes, but it's likable. Given its unstable mishmash of thuggery and whimsy, that's something of an achievement.

Like the spirit it celebrates, "The Angel's Share" is a neat little jolt of pleasure - and guaranteed to leave you feeling just a mite warmer.

While a few farcical moments fizzle, it's mostly charming.

"The Angels' Share" leaves a warm glow.

The usual Loachian elements are all in place, but there is a gentle spirit at work here as well, and not just the alcoholic spirits around which the plot revolves.

The Angels' Share is a stellar bit of activist cinema with a light touch.

Sweet-natured and high-spirited, it's a fanciful fable with a wee dash of magical realism.

This is one of the most likable movies so far this year.

Although the English director Ken Loach has been making socially conscious movies for close to 50 years, this shaggy comedy unfolds like the work of a young man on a lark.

With The Angels' Share, Ken Loach expertly combines a handful of genres which congeal into an often funny, always charming affair that serves as a salute to whisky to boot.

Loach films have been funny while making their point before (see "Riff Raff"), but this one is imbued with a little bit of magic...Those offended by four letter words should be warned that even the voice of God slings a heavy dose of them here.

Ken Loach comedy about young Glaswegian reprobates fighting for a second chance has charm aplenty, but suffers from occasional portions of cheese and a hard-to-swallow premise (whisky-tasting as gateway to a better life).

I'm not suggesting The Angels' Share is a chock full of bellylaughs, but it's the first Loach film in some time that lacks the sensation of having a plastic grocery bag pulled over one's face.

Some good laughs and a passable air of bonhomie do nothing to cover up the fact that The Angels' Share is totally lightweight and distractingly underdone.

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Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_angels_share/

academy awards 2012 nominations independent spirit awards 2012 jan brewer independent spirit awards 2012 oscar predictions jim jones tony stewart