"There's gold in them thar hills," is not the cry you might expect to come up from the residents of a tiny Scottish highland town.

But gold fever sweeps through Tullybridge after a nugget of ore is discovered by Fitz (Sives) gripped in the hand of a dead crofter.

Together with fellow reluctant residents Nellie (Robertson) and Seany (McKidd), he sees the find as their ticket out of a town where quiche is regarded as "jumped up pie."

However, complications arise when Nellie's grocery van, with the nugget hidden in a religious dashboard icon, is impounded by a local hood.

Until they hand over £1,000, they're not going to get the gold-bearing transit van back and rekindle their hopes of a new life.

This tartan tale tootles along pleasantly enough but the storyline is so feeble it would have trouble standing up without the aid of a wee dram.

A sub-plot involving a vengeful curling club president sounds funnier than it actually is while the casual death of a property developer under the wheels of his own Land Rover isn't actually funny at all.

James Cosmo makes the most of laidback local hood Big John, a family-friendly enforcer, while Dougray Scott (who also executive produced) pops up as a fence.

It's all a bit Monarch of the Glen with some black humour thrown in and shouldn't really have strayed further than the television schedules.

An indifferent blended rather than a single malt.

Tim Evans