Down the M6 goes Hector, hitch-hiking to London to spend Christmas in a favourite shelter. Fifteen years on the street, Hector (Peter Mullan) knows how dangerous homelessness can be, but it’s not clear if first-time writer-director Jake Gavin does too. Bar an icy blast of tragedy in the opening act, Hector’s life is pretty sweet. The shelter’s wonderful: the staff are saintly and there’s seconds on the cooked breakfast. It’s refreshing that not every film need be so desperate about homelessness, but Hector is social realism that often feels unrelated to reality. “Hunger is being used as a weapon,” said director Ken Loach recently, citing the “conscious cruelty” of Tory cuts. Fiction has offered Hector a warm cuddly shield.
