The Duke
Directed by Roger Michell
Running time: 1h 36m | REVIEWED BY GUY LODGE
Jim Broadbent and Helen Mirren star in The Duke
When director Roger Michell passed away last year at the age of 65, the various ensuing tributes and obituaries were testament to the value of a great journeyman filmmaker. Too often sidelined by critics in favour of brand-name auteurs who supposedly dream their films from the ground up, the journeyman instead adapts agilely to the demands of any script handed them — and Michell could bring equal elegance, intelligence and polish to a romcom (Notting Hill), a psychological thriller (Changing Lanes) or a Jane Austen heritage piece (his particularly underrated Persuasion). Finally in cinemas after premiering at Venice in 2020, his last film The Duke exemplifies his knack for classy crowdpleasers where formula isn’t applied at the expense of heart. It’s an old-school British caper in the Ealing Studios tradition, modestly but glowingly crafted and beautifully acted by old pros — and you leave it both buoyant and a little sad. Making that feel easy is hard.
Lest the title mislead you, The Duke is not a film about the aristocracy. It refers to Goya’s portrait of The Duke of Wellington in London — which, in 1961, 60-year-old Newcastle cabbie Kempton Bunton (Jim Broadbent) decided to steal. Somehow pulling off a shabby, amateur heist, he stashes the painting at home, unbeknownst to his exasperated wife Dorothy (Helen Mirren), and holds it ransom — demanding greater benefits for the elderly in exchange for its return. It’s a Robin Hood sort of story, so madcap that it simply has to be true, though Michell and writers Richard Bean and Clive Coleman thankfully treat it more as a romp than a biopic, playing its spry comic beats against its unexpected social conscience. And Broadbent, too often required to sleepwalk through stock roles, is a delight in this, his Bunton a winning blend of underdog pluck, justified righteousness and a touch of genuine madness. It’s a film marked by affection and good humour, and a suitably warm farewell for its director.
THE DUKE (2020) Written by Richard Bean, Clive Coleman | Shot by Mike Eley | Edited by Kristina Hetherington
In cinemas now