Life in black and white seems more colourful and vibrant in writer-director Kenneth Branagh’s wondrous coming-of-age drama, drawn from the film-maker’s vast well of childhood experiences in 1960s Belfast.

Sincerely dedicated to the people of the Northern Irish capital – “For the ones who stayed. For the ones who left. And for all the ones who were lost” – Branagh’s most personal film unfolds from the perspective of a nine-year-old rapscallion called Buddy (played by luminous newcomer Jude Hill), who we first see romping around the streets with his pals, brandishing a home-made wooden sword and using an upturned dustbin lid as a shield.

The cheeky tyke is slaying imaginary dragons but the invisible enemy, which is poised to roar and tear apart Protestant and Catholic communities, is a two-headed hydra of political and nationalistic fervour.

Principal characters in Branagh’s script are referred to simply by their familial ties to Buddy – Ma, Pa, Granny and Pop – tapping into an undercurrent of charming childhood innocence that insulates the boy from the harsh reality of barricades being hastily erected at the end of the street or a local supermarket being looted during a riot.

Indeed, when the prospect of leaving Belfast for good solidifies, Buddy is most troubled about leaving behind his school crush, a girl called Catherine, who repeatedly scores top marks in teacher Miss Lewis’s tests of the children’s times tables.

The simple mathematics of Branagh’s crowd-pleasing film add up to a beautifully crafted valentine to a city in the grip of devastating change and a resilient and warm-hearted people, who mine humour in adversity.