Film of the week Forsyth’s classic Glasgow crime caper

THAT SINKING FEELING

Saturday, BBC Scotland, 9.30pm

TURNED down for funding by the British Film Institute in 1978 because the project he wanted to make was deemed too commercial – it was called Gregory’s Girl – first-time director Bill Forsyth turned instead to the members of the Glasgow Youth Theatre he had befriended and, with virtually no money, came up out this cock-eyed crime caper.

Partly improvised and shot on the hoof in a dreich and dreary Glasgow on the cusp of change but still showing extreme signs of neglect, it follows unemployed Ronnie (Robert Buchanan) as he hatches a harebrained get-rich-quick scheme.

‘What’s this area known for?’ he asks pals Wal (Billy Greenlees), Vic (John Hughes), Alec (Allan Love) and Simmy (Douglas Sannachan). ‘Drunks. Murder. Multiple social depravation,’ they reply.

‘And sinks!’ Ronnie beams. His plan is to steal some, of the stainless steel variety, from a factory up the road.

There are some great moments of Forsythian comedy, such as when the camera pulls away from a car the friends are sitting in to show it as a wheel-less wreck stranded on wasteland. Or a silent long shot in which Wal cadges a cigarette from a young girl knocking a ball against a tenement wall.

There are fond homages to everything from Ealing comedies to Some Like It Hot (Wal and Vic dress as women to distract a night watchman), and there’s a generous cameo from Edinburgh gallerist/ art world legend Richard Demarco sending himself up as he mistakes Wal’s pile of sinks for an art installation and buys it for £200. A lucky detail or a seer-like intimation of how post-industrial Glasgow would reinvent itself through the creative industries? You decide.

Finally, in a scene-stealing bit part, we’re treated to a sight of John Gordon Sinclair, appearing here as Gordon Sinclair. He would go on to star in Gregory’s Girl when, a year later, it was finally made, along with Buchanan (as Andy), Love (Eric) and Greenlees (Steve).

Given that, some may view

That Sinking Feeling as merely an appetiser. Not a bit of it. Forsyth’s skill as director, his vision and the chaotic creative energy of his young cast make this a film which stands entirely on its own.

Somewhat anticipating Alasdair Gray’s Lanark (published in 1981) it opens with the disclaimer that it takes place in a fictitious “town” called Glasgow and that any similarity to the real place is entirely incidental. While it took Ken Loach decades to meld social realism with a witty, Glasgow-set crime caper in 2012’s The Angel’s Share, Forsyth does it here with no budget and in his first film as a feature director.