Up from the heart of the Gorbals he rose
Don't tramp on his toes for everyone knows
From then on when we see the bend in your nose
We'll all sing, Benny has been

 In a country which treats its sporting heroes with reverential awe, it should come as no surprise that the achievements of Benny Lynch have endured. It is just more than 70 years since the "Hero of the Gorbals" returned to Scotland as the nation's first world boxing champion.

His remarkable victory over Jackie Brown in Manchester in September 1935, achieved in just two rounds, sparked memorable scenes of jubilation on the streets of his home town.

At Glasgow's Central Station, 20,000 crammed into the concourse to greet the arrival of the new flyweight champion of the world on the 2:20 express from Manchester. Thousands more lined the streets that lead to his home in the Gorbals.

Some maintain that Lynch was the greatest Scottish pugilist to part the ropes. His achievements were undeniably momentous. A plaque was unveiled in his memory around 20 years ago but the presence of Benny Lynch Court, just off Old Rutherglen Road, ensures that a corner of the district which nurtured him will always remain.

The Gorbals, of course, has undergone significant regeneration and gentrification in recent years and is now unrecognisable from Lynch's day. In the 1920s and 30s, it was a melting pot of different nationalities, populated by Highlanders, Jews, Poles, Lithuanians and those fleeing the Irish Potato Famine. It was against a backdrop of overcrowding and grinding poverty that Lynch rose to conquer the world.

It is an inspiring, heroic and ultimately tragic tale - from his street fighting days, through to the development of his talent in the travelling boxing booths which toured the country, then his association with the legendary trainer, Sammy Wilson, which catapulted him to stardom. The subsequent descent into alcoholism and his premature death from pneumonia in August 1946, at the age of 33, formed a tragic footnote to the life of a genuine folk hero.

Attempts have been made to commit the story to film. Little has been heard recently of one project, involving Scottish actor Robert Carlyle. The other, directed by Bill Bryden, who wrote the award-winning 1970s play, Benny, is gathering momentum.

Financial constraints have held it back, but the development phase started two weeks ago and it is hoped that filming will begin next year, with the Scottish actor, Iain Robertson, in the lead role. The film will be based on Bryden's script and seek to relay the facts of Lynch's life in an accurate manner, without immortalising or demonising him.

Previous projects have met with strong resistance from Lynch's family, who are now based in Canada. In particular, the family remain sensitive to the portrayal of the boxer towards the end of his life, when he was in the grip of alcoholism.

It prompts a reflection on film's ability to mould legacies. The Oscar-winning 1981 film, Chariots of Fire, brought the story of Eric Liddell to a whole new audience, recounting the Scottish athlete's gold medal-winning exploits at the Paris Olympics in 1924. Inevitably, though, elements of artistic licence are always employed in such projects.

In the film, Liddell finds out just before he boards the cross-channel ferry to France that the 100m final will be on a Sunday and, ultimately, decides that he will not run on the grounds that it falls on the Sabbath.

In reality, the schedule was announced several months in advance and Liddell was afforded ample time to train for the 400m instead.

Patricia Russell, the eldest of Liddell's three daughters, admitted in an enlightening interview with The Herald last year that the family had been "very apprehensive about Chariots of Fire" but conceded that, in the end "they did a magnificent job". Even then, there were one or two aspects which rankled.

Liddell's sister, Jenny, whose character in the film expresses her grave concerns that athletics was deflecting her brother from his missionary work, felt that it had portrayed her as "a proper prig".

In addition, his family argue that the truly remarkable episodes of Liddell's life occurred post-1924, particularly the war years spent in the Weifang POW camp, where he eventually died of a brain tumour in 1945. They are currently in discussions about a possible screenplay regarding the "post-Chariots" period of Liddell's life.

The filming of someone's life story is a fraught affair for family and friends and the challenge for the film-maker should be to preserve the memory of the subject without taking harmful liberties with the facts. Whether that will be achieved in Lynch's case remains to be seen.

Meantime, there is always the superb biography by John Burrowes, Benny: The Life and Times of a Fighting Legend and a couple of excellent websites which record his feats.

No matter what century we are living in, stories that are worth the telling will never die . . . even if they never reach the big screen.