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Local Hero

Local Hero

Comedy · Drama · 1983

An American oil company sends a man to Scotland to buy up an entire village where they want to build a refinery. But things don't go as expected.

Movie details

Local Hero

“THE STORY OF AN ORDINARY MAN IN AN EXTRAORDINARY PLACE.”

1983 Comedy · Drama 1h 51m

Critical arithmetic

The consensus, allegedly.

IMDb

7.3 / 10

29K votes

Rotten Tomatoes

100 %

Tomatometer

Metacritic

83 / 100

Metascore

TMDB

6.8 / 10

Community rating

External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.

An American oil company sends a man to Scotland to buy up an entire village where they want to build a refinery. But things don't go as expected.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over Local Hero?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

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Where it lives

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Streaming availability data supplied by JustWatch.

Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Bill Forsyth

Written by

Bill Forsyth

Burt Lancaster

Burt Lancaster

Felix Happer

Peter Riegert

Peter Riegert

"Mac" MacIntyre

Denis Lawson

Denis Lawson

Gordon Urquhart

Fulton Mackay

Fulton Mackay

Ben Knox

Peter Capaldi

Peter Capaldi

Danny Oldsen

Jennifer Black

Jennifer Black

Stella Urquhart

Jenny Seagrove

Jenny Seagrove

Marina

Court is in session

Put Local Hero on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Prestige Tourist

“Sincerity is not manipulation.”

The film risks embarrassment to make emotion communal, and that openness is harder than fashionable detachment.

The prosecution The Popcorn Loyalist

“The strings are showing.”

Every cue tells you exactly what to feel and when, leaving sentiment to do the work character should have done.