Westleton Film Night 2nd December 2023

Local Hero

Doors and Bar will open at 7.00 pm, the film will start at 7.30 pm, with an interval.

Entrance £5.00. Tickets available on the door.

Local Hero is a 1983 Scottish comedy-drama film written and directed by Bill Forsyth and starring Peter
Riegert, Peter Capaldi, Denis Lawson, Fulton Mackay and Burt Lancaster. Produced by David Puttnam,
the film is about an American oil company representative who is sent to the fictional village of Ferness
on the west coast of Scotland to purchase the town and surrounding property for his company.

"Mac" MacIntyre is a typical 1980s hot-shot executive working for Knox Oil and Gas in Houston, Texas.
The company's eccentric head, Felix Happer, sends him (largely because his surname sounds Scottish)
to acquire Ferness, a village in the Scottish Highlands, to make way for a refinery. Mac (who is actually
of Hungarian extraction) is a little apprehensive about his assignment, complaining to a co-worker that
he would rather handle business over the phone and via telex. Happer, an avid amateur astronomer,
tells Mac to watch the sky and to notify him immediately if he sees anything unusual.
Upon arriving in Scotland, Mac teams up with local Knox representative Danny Oldsen. During a visit to
a Knox research facility in Aberdeen, Dr. Geddes and his assistant Watt inform them about the scope of
the company's plans, which entail replacing Ferness with the refinery. They also meet (and admire)
marine researcher Marina.
Mac ultimately spends several weeks in Ferness, gradually adapting to the slower-paced life and
getting to know the eccentric residents, most notably hotel owner and accountant Gordon Urquhart,
and his wife Stella. As time passes, Mac becomes more and more conflicted as he presses to close the
deal that will end the quaint little village he has come to love. Unbeknownst to him, however, the
villagers are tired of their hard life and are more than eager to sell, though they feign indifference to
induce a larger offer.

Synopsis from Wikipedia