Bittersweet, audience friendly and told through the eyes of children: coming of age movies have a cliché-ridden logic all their own. You're My Hero does little to change the essential formula, but its familiarity manages to breed charm, not contempt, as it tells the story of pubescent Ramon (Manuel Lozano). A bully magnet at his new school, Ramon finds himself battling more than just the other children as Spain erupts into turmoil after the death of General Franco.

Caught up in the hormonal confusion of adolescence, Ramon is torn between admiring the class tearaways - led by Mateo (Toni Cantó) - and falling in love with pretty classmate Paloma (Carmen Navarro). With the mysteries of sex high on the agenda it's a difficult time, which is why Ramon's grateful for the advice of Chief Watercloud (Antonio Dechent), a six foot Native American who steps out of a western to give him advice on becoming the hero of his own life.

"A DISARMINGLY LIKEABLE FEATURE"

Locating this tale in the mid-70s, director Antonio Cuadri makes excellent use of the era's fashions and fads. Flares and elongated lapels give the kids a pleasingly retro look, while posters for One Million Years B.C. - showing Raquel Welch in a fur bikini - hint at the frustrated sexual desire of these boys as they race to become men.

Light on its feet and glowing with warmth, this disarmingly likeable feature gains some weight by setting its story against the backdrop of General Franco's death and the collapse of the Fascist era. With Ramon convinced that he's the cause of Franco's demise and eager to make sense of the many "-isms" floating around in the great dictator's wake, Cuadri succeeds inverts the usual coming of age storyline in favour of something different.

Here, adulthood doesn't mark the end of some childhood innocence but a rediscovery of the political and sexual freedoms that the repressive Franco years denied Spanish citizens.