The Innocent

Set in a cotton-mill town in the depths of the '30s depression, this professes to offer a truthful picture of life and love on the dole, but too often settles for quaint nostalgia. A young epileptic roams the Yorkshire dales (spectacularly shot) in search of the rare, wonderful kingfisher when the adult world becomes too bewildering and tough. The film has all the makings of a Sunday afternoon tearjerker, only MacKenzie is too honest to pull too heavily on the heartstrings. He is rewarded by merely revealing the thinness of the characterisation and the meagreness of the script.