My Old School

In 1993, 16-year-old Brandon Lee enrolled at Bearsden Academy, a secondary school in a well-to-do suburb of Glasgow, Scotland. What followed over the next two years would become the stuff of legend.

I will admit to having been brought up a stone's throw from Bearsden (a well-off suburb of Glasgow in Scotland) though some years before this actually took place. The story is all about "Brandon Lee" - portrayed here by Alan Cumming. He rather famously enrolled at a school and passed for a 16 year old pupil, fairly effortlessly, until a series of unfortunate mishaps lead to a rather startling discovery and a tissue of lies and deceit. Aside from a little illuminating actuality at the end, it is largely delivered to us by way of commentaries from the man's contemporaries - now in their forties - describing the fascinating chronology of just what happened. Some of these contributions are superbly pithy. Beware there is plenty of ripe Glasgow vernacular, but it's never gratuitous - indeed, for much of this film it is more emanating from the increasingly incredulous narrative as many of his school mates find out the truth for the first time since 1993. It tries to explain just how incompetent the vetting system at the school was (though the truth being stranger than fiction element of the behaviour of "Lee" probably mitigates that a little) and it works really well. I think my favourite observation has to come from the tattooed "Dave McKinley" who in one short sentence summed up the whole scenario... It certainly helps if you are local, but nonetheless, this is a well constructed, paced and frankly quite fascinating drama documentary that features the actors (and their voices) but sparingly. It's left to his colleagues to provide the narrative, and alongside some engaging animation I found it really quite entertaining.