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local hero (Warner Studios, 1983)

Through the eyes of alienated visitors, Lost in Translation, a current popular movie, evokes a sense of place that is foreign and impenetrable: a bewildered outsiders' view of Japan. This device - a traveler's curious observation of a foreign culture - reminds me of Local Hero, a timeless movie made in 1983 by Scottish director Bill Forsythe and David Putnam, producer of Chariots of Fire. Local Hero is available now on VHS/DVD.

The story unfolds from the top of a Houston skyscraper where a bizarre, self-involved oil company CEO, played by Burt Lancaster, seeks to expand his empire by buying out a tiny Scottish village on the shore of the North Sea and replacing it with a new oil refinery. He sends his confident, top-notch negotiator, Mac MacIntyre, across the ocean to acquire Ferness. Accompanied by Peter, a young Scottish man who works for the oil company, Mac drives across the rural countryside discovering a world he has never experienced.

Mac's encounter with Ferness begins with the village's chief negotiator, a warm, unhurried man who serves as both the innkeeper and the unofficial mayor. Expecting a community of country bumpkins reluctant to change, Mac instead finds himself in the midst of a complicated, intriguing community, one that engages him in a quiet game of cat and mouse. The villagers, thrilled at the prospect of becoming millionaires, are out of sight, working together to ensure they receive the highest possible offer for their land. They must reach a group consensus to complete the sale.

Mac and Peter are driven businessmen, walking on the beach in their suits, glancing at their watches, but they are forced to slow down and live with these people while the "mayor," Gordon Urquhart, orchestrates the pace of the talks. Mac wonders at the co-existence of old fishermen and young punks, grows to respect the views of the eccentric old beachcomber who lives in a shack on the beach, envies the passionate marriage of the innkeeper and his wife, and eventually succumbs to the pace of Ferness. While poking around the rocks at the shore, he takes off his watch and forgets it; the waves wash it away. Meanwhile, Peter grows intrigued with a mysterious and lovely Marine biologist who has her own interest in this section of the North Sea.

At the culmination of the long negotiations, Mac and Peter join in the village's all-night celebration where Mac is seduced by Ferness and the joyous ceilidh dance. They are joined by a Soviet trawler captain who is viewed not as the enemy by these people, but as a man who loves life as they do. By this point, neither Mac nor the old beachcomber are sure that razing Ferness is a good idea.

Like life, Local Hero is made up of many small moments. This movie is filled with people who seem to understand this and provides a glimpse of openness and community that celebrates our oneness. Welcome as it was in the middle of the greedy Cold War era, Local Hero still entertains in our own uncertain, distrustful times.
- nancy hirsch

Copyright 2004, all rights reserved. You can contact Nancy at njh02@earthlink.net.