91Èȱ¬

Twenty years ago, Peter Mullan’s film Orphans shocked and wowed audiences around the world. This funny and poignant documentary reunites the cast as they remember the film that changed their lives.

Peter Mullan is famous for being an actor, director and writer. He has had roles in the iconic Scottish films of the 1990s and is now in much demand in America. Orphans was his first feature film, and he filmed it in the Southside of Glasgow, around the streets he grew up. Peter takes us on a tour of his Govanhill and Pollokshields, to show us the alleyways were he filmed his short films and the locations for Orphans. He tells us about the films that inspired him to ‘create his own world, based on the people I saw around me’.

Bringing the orphans back together again, actors Douglas Henshall, Gary Lewis, Stephen McCole and Rosemarie Stevenson reminisce over an exciting time for their careers and the impact the film has had on their lives. The ambitious film is a time capsule of the Scottish filmmaking scene, and even the smaller roles are brimming with talent. Alex Norton is the angriest barman ever witnessed on screen, Frank Gallagher is a dodgy crook, in a role that paved the way for River City’s defining gangster, Lenny.

Darkly comedic and painfully poignant, Orphans is now regarded as a cult classic of European cinema. It cemented Peter Mullan’s career as a writer-director and also helped its cast and crew on their roads to success. Twenty years on it’s time to revisit this audacious classic of Scottish and world cinema.