Bank of Dave (2023) Dir. Chris Foggin

A modern folk tale of a little man taking on the big guys, this true-ish story stars Rory Kinnear (excellent in last year’s Alex Garland horror MEN) as a Burnley businessman who has been helping his community with personal loans but aims to do further good by opening his own bank.

Against him though, in this post-banking crash timeline, is a set of powerful corporate financial institutions standing in his way. Helping him along journey is London lawyer Hugh (Joe Fry) who starts by seeing the situation as a way to his develop his own career but ends up falling in love, literally with Phoebe Dynevor as Alexandra, and symbolically with Dave’s honourable cause and the friendly down-to-earth locals of the town.

Based on the real antics of Dave Fishwick, the movie takes huge liberties with the truth (stadium-rockers Def Leppard were not involved in the scheme) but its smile-inducing simplicity ensures its heart-warming moments are pushed front and centre.

Uncomplicated and simple, often to a fault, the straightforward narrative and clichéd characters break zero new ground, yet I enjoyed the surface-level pleasures in this underdog tale.

In these dark times, not every film needs to be a cynical, in-depth deconstruction of economic politics and it steers from satires like The Big Short and more info Full Monty territory. It’s nowhere near as satisfying as that film but Bank of Dave uses its gentle class-war story to provide a feel-good film you’ll forget immediately after watching it.

And for the right audience who can get on board with this unfussy palate-cleanser, it’s a sympathetic fairy tale where a man sticks it to the right unscrupulous villains. And one that also meant real charities and neighbourhoods benefited as a result of a sincere wish to support a struggling community.

★★½

Michael Sales

Bank of Dave is available on Netflix UK now