A Glasgow man visits war-torn Nicaragua with a refugee tormented by her memories.
Acting
Carlyle's George: working-class heroism without Hollywood varnish.
Direction
Loach mixes professional actors with Nicaraguan survivors. Raw authenticity.
Production
Shot in actual Contra war zones. The danger bleeds through.
Director
Ken Loach
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Oyanka Cabezas was a non-professional actor and actual Nicaraguan refugee; her trauma testimony scenes draw from real survivor accounts Loach collected.
The film was part of a wave of 1980s British cinema explicitly supporting Sandinista Nicaragua, making it nearly impossible to fund through conventional channels—Channel 4 backed it as controversial public-service programming.
NI
GB
