There is much stock to be found in Fisherman’s Friends, yet its good-hearted nature, mesmerising scenery, and infectious songs keeps this feelgood, somewhat based on true story, above water.

The Fisherman’s Friends are indeed a real singing group from the small fishing village of Port Isaac, Cornwall, who rose to prominence with their pitch-perfect delivery of sea-shanties and folk songs which warmed the hearts of a nation. Their story of triumph, tragedy, and song would one day make for a potentially good biopic. Fisherman’s Friends is not that movie.

Directed by Chris Foggin (Kids in Love), and based on a screenplay by Piers Ashworth (St Trinian’s), Meg Leonard (Finding Your Feet), and Nick Moorcroft (Burke and Hare), this 112 minute feature is a highly fictionalised account about how these men from Cornwall became a national sensation.

The film stars Daniel Mays as Danny, a music manager who, while on a stag weekend in Cornwall, is pranked into signing a group of fishermen that serenade their hometown with songs of the sea and their land. Soon this dare becomes an infatuation with not only the music, but with the spirit of Port Isaac and its gruff yet friendly inhabitants, particularly Alwyn (Tuppence Middleton) with whom Danny begins a relationship. She is the daughter of Jim (James Purefoy), the spokesman for the Fisherman’s Friends who is as tough as he is fair.

Many more of these stock-like caricatures are found in Fisherman’s Friends. There is the wise yet cheeky elder of the group Jago (Daivd Hayman), his no-nonsense brash talking wife Maggie (Maggie Steed), and unscrupulous music mogul Troy (Noel Clarke) who lobbies for the Fisherman’s Friends to fail. It’s all part and parcel of a movie that curtails to a type, namely the feelgood British comedy that has bee in regular traction since The Full Monty became a huge hit.

Yet as far as caricature driven movies go, Fisherman’s Friends has charm, song, and a unique setting to create a buffer of difference from the rest of the Brit-com pack. The mixture of Port Isaac’s cinematic setting and the soaring vocals of its main players is particularly strong, and especially provides a distraction when things become predictable, and does it ever.

A cast of well-known character actors all do good work, with particular mention to James Purefoy as the town spokesman with gruff exterior yet beautiful singing voice. It all makes for a pleasant feelgood yarn, although a rather predictable one.