Ken Loach, perhaps the most accomplished and intelligent Marxist practitioner of social realism left in England, stretches his impressive talents in this 1995 film, depicting the Spanish civil war from the perspective of a young unemployed communist from Liverpool (Ian Hart) who joins the Republican anti-Franco forces. Scripted by Jim Allen, who also wrote Loach’s Raining Stones, this is historically convincing as well as grippingLoach near his passionate bestand, far from offering a standard defense of the communist position, it presents a detailed revisionist critique of the party’s betrayal of other leftist factions in Spain. With Rosana Pastor, Iciar Bollain, Tom Gilroy, and Frederic Pierrot. 109 min. (JR)