Jimmy’s Hall

There’s a valedictory feel to what could be Ken Loach’s final dramatic feature, a fictionalised portrait of a real-life resistance leader whose struggle against the establishment in 1930s Ireland mirrors Loach’s own. Yet there’s also a sense that the Kes director has loosened up enough to let the report of James Gralton, a returning ex-pat whose re-opened hall becomes a beacon of free-thinking in the Country Lentrim bog, have a life of its own, beyond that of a mere metaphor.

The result might be slight but, like small-known star Barry Ward, has an affability that’s hard to fake.