Month: December 2024

By Emilia Brookfield-Pertusini

I hate tradition. I possess a bah-humbug approach to these supposedly ‘heart-warming’ events we must trudge through for time’s sake. However, I allow myself three indulgences, exceptions to the rule: 1) re-read The Secret History every December. 2) Listen to the King’s College, Cambridge choir carols on a blistering walk. 3)Watch a theatrical telling of A Christmas Carol. Upon hearing A Christmas Carol was descending upon Durham’s vastly beautiful wintery mood, I couldn’t help but be delighted (my student finance imposed tightfistedness, echoing Scrooge, in my refusal to see The Old Vic’s Carol this year). Upon watching, this elation hasn’t departed. Whilst Walkabout’s production doesn’t attempt to sugarcoat the obvious haunting and wrath that lies within this tale, the delicate adaptation of Dickens’ most recognisable plot, the craftsmanship of the design team, and the bravado of the actors cannot help but bring an audience to smile with pure, innocent joy. Lily Gilchrist and Harry Threapleton, the directors and adaptors, have marvelled in their sharp, poignant, and ultimately Victorian, to its truest sense, production. 

The bustle of the stage works in A Christmas Carol’s favour well. To be moved by a cast, who stop, look at you, extend their arm and holiday wishes, before moving on, retiring in their own magical scenes elsewhere, that you are privy to, is a truly magical voyeuristic experience. All whilst a superbly talented choir is fully incorporated into the momentum of the play, embellishing the scenes with further tenderness. These Victorians manoeuvre around a set, designed by Carrie Cheung and her team, that strikes a careful balance between kitsch Victoriana, and haunting minimalism. With the names of cast members upon gravestones in the corner, and a hearty dinner setup in the other, the balance is struck brilliantly between the two moods of the story and is maintained as audience moves carefully between the two, savouring in each. Charlie (Cara Crofts), our dutiful tour guide of Victorian London encapsulates this boundless energy that possess us during such festivity. The bubbly nature of a character who drives the plot, and encapsulates the cultural artifice that Carol has become, was not lost; this is an actor who understood their role to their fullest potential and brought the Dickensian prose into startling, striking life. The now diffuse and diluted term of Dickensian is often misused, not in the case of Crofts however, who elevated the practical necessity of her character to a person an audience member was delighted to see shepherd us spritely and provide us with brilliantly timed witty asides. 

Wit is often prescribed to Scrooge in order to make the shamelessly brutal character easier to digest. Gilchrist and Threapleton’s adaptation struck a considered balance with Scrooge, allowing Edward Clark to channel the disturbing miser to his fullest, whilst giving the audience moments of comedic breathing space, necessary to hammer home in the absurd, condemnable nature of Scrooge. Clark’s masterful performance delved into the psyche of such a miser at points, humanising Scrooge with pathos carefully being delivered in beautifully fraught and tender moments between Clark and his cast mates. Whilst I have often been considered as someone who enjoys the bleak moroseness that theatre can harbinger, Clark’s performance of a transformed Scrooge was simply too joyous to consider. The beauty of immersive theatre, I believe, lies in the fact the audience become less isolated, both from the actors and their fellow audience members; upon being shook by a contagiously gleeful Scrooge, I couldn’t help but smile, catching the same elation beaming out of Scrooge, and in my shock of being touched by both theatre and character, looked around to witness my fellow travellers through Victorian London beaming in the same manner. The strength of the adaptation of this complex figure, and the magisterial delivery of Clark, was something to behold.

Mark Gatiss remarks on how Carol’s “status as a ghost story has been somewhat undervalued”. This is shocking considering the Victorian preoccupation with ‘the other side’ yet cannot be said about this production; the consideration of lighting (Rory Collins) emulating the haunting necessity of the story thrillingly from the offset, despite not being utilized as fully later on. The introduction of our first ghost, by means of a howling metamorphosing doorknocker, confirms Carol’s status within the ghost story genre, with Raphael Henrion’s Marley being a startingly frightening, yet darkly humorous figure. Despite the script occasionally lapsing into the silliness that often grasps adaptations of Carol, Henrion managed to create a presence that channelled irksome impressions of the lost, tormented souls of Dante’s Purgatorio that Marley should be reminiscent of. The spectral reigns are then taken up by the Ghost of Christmas Past (Nell Hickson), who catapults us through the pangs of Christmas nostalgia with a foreboding deliverance. Her delivery and duplicity came into full force in her scathing departure from a relenting Scrooge, leaving both him and the audiences’ jaw on the floor. Bounding on stage after is Grace Heron as Present, emitting such a warmth onto stage it is hard to believe the phantom categorising of this being. A bountiful harbinger of news, we, like the marionettes cleverly chosen to physicalise the ghosts’ message, are caught up in the rapturous display of Christmas truths, forcing the message of change and charity to the forefront of the production; an understanding of the duality of this character, and the tale itself, was on full display. Finally, Future (Iphis Critchlow), who’s silent existence on stage sliced through the audience, allowed for the spectral potential of the production to be achieved in its completion. Each actor of this sinister quartet played with the audience’s perception of haunting, bring performances that kept the pace of the haunting at a constant revelry. 

The whimsy and magic of the immersive experience embraces the auditorium, handling every aspect with such clear sensitivity. The Cratchits are, despite my fond revisiting of this tale annually, cause for contention; Tiny Tim and his family cawing in mockney Victorian poverty pomp behind him makes one cringe under the amount of Victorian ‘virtuous’ poor narrative and disability fetish typically on display. However, a refreshing, modern consideration for the family were incorporated against the Victoriana. The pity porn was replaced with a quintet of talented actors who handled their roles with care, creating tender scenes; their warmth on stage was something to behold, and the dynamic between Charlotte Walton’s Bob and Scrooge was masterfully handled without the usual retreat into caricaturist workplace abuse. Instead, the ignorant optimism reserved for them was wholly invested into the pompously cheerful Fred (Nemo Royle). Adorned in a perfectly festive turquoise blazer, we were captivated around the dinner table, whilst he stood on a chair, like a true festive host, to address us, his guests, into parlour games; whilst at points the character began to sentimentalise and err on the side of tangent, the gusto of deliverance was to be relished, and an invitation back to his table would be received wholly.

The playfulness of the novella is fully anticipated when, on sofa or on theatre seat, one sits down to watch A Christmas Carol, yet the unbridled, unrelenting imaginative magic is full realised when we’re invited into stand within the tradition of this tale. If only more people could be invited to spend an evening around a Dickensian Christmas tale, then perhaps this tale would not need to be told year upon year, as the cast, crew, and production team clearly understood in their adaptation the unfortunate poignancy of the charitable message, which, as Scrooge does in the final moments of the play, grips you. The combination of theatrical enchantment and spectral illusion ensures that Christmas magic is released upon all who enter into this glimpse of Victorian London. The fun, nuanced, and gripping production affirms why A Christmas Carol is a powerhouse of a Christmas tradition. 

By Esme Bell

This is an easy pun to make, but it was with genuine sadness that I left Durham’s Gala cinema last week, after watching Ridley Scott’s latest sequel, Gladiator II.

It is perhaps unfair to say that it completely lacked entertainment value. It was a fun spectacle, at least, peopled with a dynamic and watchable cast – and, as my (Irish) friend Rachel mistily remarked, we can’t forget Paul Mescal’s ‘lovely Gaelic thighs’.

But Gaelic thighs alone cannot – and should not – make a film; and even a whole legion of Irish heartthrobs, no matter how well-muscled, could not atone for Gladiator II’s sins.

I have to preface the rest of this article by asserting how much I love the original, 2000 Gladiator; and so what follows could be seen as irritatingly nit-picking, or a failure to appreciate the new film for its own sake. I (obviously) disagree: Gladiator II as a commercial concept rests entirely on the deserved victory of the first one, and it actively appropriates the plot, music and even physical clips from its originator. This worked well in a film like Top Gun: Maverick, for instance – which proved that a loving sequel to an adored original can absolutely pay homage to its roots, but be completely successful in its own right. Gladiator II, however, fails on both counts.

Perhaps the gravest flaw – which catalyses most of the rest of the issues – is in the screenplay. It is, quite simply, lacking – in warmth, subtlety, heroism, and frankly, any sense of memorability. 

I, too, would probably lose a battle against an invading Roman army if I had to listen to Mescal’s attempt at an opening rallying speech. It falls so fatally flat, and seems so painfully self-aware of its inferiority, when compared to the glorious ease of Russell Crowe’s speech at the opening of the first film. This inevitable comparison continues: we have nothing to rival ‘Are you not entertained?’ or the chilling intensity of ‘Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife’ speech. And, again, this didn’t have to become such a glaring problem, but when Mescal’s Lucius is literally and metaphorically Maximus 2.0 – how can we ignore all the ways in which he fails to live up to him?

This brings me to my next point, which I make reluctantly, but truthfully: Mescal was a fundamentally underwhelming leading man. His occasional lapse in accent is forgivable, as Crowe also frequently slips into an Australian drawl; given the Roman Empire’s sprawling nature, it perhaps makes sense that someone’s accent might “travel” too. And, I also concede that most of Mescal’s flaws are the product, again, of the script and the plot, which allowed his character very little nuance or softness. But, the fact remains that, across the film, he acts and speaks on one, growly, broody, bear-like level, with very little variation.

One of the most powerful moments of Gladiator is not a battle, but simply a conversation early on, when Maximus describes his home to Marcus Aurelius: his house, his olives, his vines, the earth ‘black as my wife’s hair’, the wild ponies who tease his son. Crowe’s curt, cropped-haired violence is layered effortlessly with a tender, but never mawkish, vision of Maximus the farmer, who longs only for hearth and home. And this is crucial: we have to believe in his home, in his love – in the holistic man beyond The General – to then share in his grief, accept his need for revenge, and understand the man he becomes. 

We are granted no such insight into Lucius as he grunts, rolls, shouts, fights, and rolls again across the screen (Mescal does spend a lot of time on the ground with his tunic riding dangerously high – little wonder his thighs became so significant). And this critical distance from the audience’s empathy and understanding is not just frustrating, but becomes actively confusing. He asserts his passionate hatred for Lucilla (his mother) and Rome in one moment, and shortly afterwards declares his intention to die for the ‘dream that was Rome’ – with seemingly little emotional or logical backing to explain the swift change.

The cast in general though was the film’s strongest asset. Both Connie Nielsen and her character had aged well, and I felt she had more gravitas and purpose in the sequel. Pedro Pascal as the sympathetic general/ go-between was also engaging with his few lines – but his character was so unsatisfyingly written that his warmth and furrowed brow were cruelly wasted. 

The twin emperors, played by Joseph Quinn and Fred Hechinger, were less slimily menacing than Joaquin Phoenix’s Commodus – but entertaining nonetheless, and they had Denzel Washington to bulk up the explicit “villainy” a bit more. As Macrinus, he was the stand-out performance for me: he walked a compelling line between power-hungry mad man and charismatic mentor. If, at times, it felt like a reprisal of his role in Training Day, this was in no way a bad thing – and an accidental detail I loved was the way that he would constantly twitch and fidget with his robes. In real Ancient Times, it must have been a logistical nightmare murdering/scheming etc. with such long sleeves.

But even an undoubtedly star-studded, TikTok-approved cast cannot perform in a vacuum: and a plot and screenplay which moves confusingly and unsatisfactorily through story and character will struggle to serve anyone.

I do think too much has been made about how “unrealistic” the shark-infested Coliseum was. The entire plots of both films require a significant suspension of disbelief; a CGI Great White can’t be the final thing that disrupts it. But, although a slight fancifulness of story is in keeping with the original spirit of Gladiator, the rest of the “scaffolding” of the film – the effects, the soundtrack, even the inexplicable image of Tim McInnerny’s senator reading a newspaper –  are just further disappointments.

Far too much energy was expended on the computer-generated baboons that Lucius faces in the arena, and their Planet of the Apes-level screams rivalled Mescal’s own acting at points. The cheesy black-and-white rendering of (presumably) the River Styx and Charon claiming Lucius’ loved ones felt similarly jarring and wrong. The music was a particular let-down, also. Zimmer’s original score is so stirring and literally iconic – and the only vaguely memorable musical moments from Gladiator II were the few times that the original theme was re-worked. Zimmer does steal from Holst’s ‘Mars’ in the first film, so I suppose there is a Gladiatorial tradition of reusing and adapting, but it didn’t happen enough to feel like a deliberate choice, and just came across as artificial, lazy – like homework that had been done the night before.

And, in essence, I think this is the ultimate problem with the film. Like James Cameron with Avatar: The Way of the Water, Ridley Scott seems to have been subsumed by his own success, and has forsaken the integrity of his original. Like an emperor trying to win cheap approval, he has treated his loyal watcher as just part of the mob, to be fobbed off with bread, circuses, CGI sharks – and a sad dilution of an initial masterpiece. 

Even the excellent ticket price at the Gala (a joyously democratic £5) doesn’t make up for what, in this sequel, we have irretrievably, unforgivably lost: strength and honour.

By Emily Hough

Paddington 2 and Paddington in Peru: like asking da Vinci to recreate the Mona Lisa with different paints. 

This past Saturday, I sat down to join my, slightly hungover, housemates in our scheduled navigation on what Netflix has to offer. After a couple of rejected suggestions of horror films, dramas and cheap-looking Christmas films, we paused over Paddington 2. 

“You know, I read somewhere that it’s the highest-rated film on Rotten Tomatoes,” my housemate shared. My other housemates responded in sheer excitement: “It is, quite literally, the best film I’ve ever seen.” This challenge alone had us sold. We pressed play and began watching, what I can confidently say, was one hour and forty-four minutes of complete and utter joy. 

Now, I understand that this may sound dramatic, and for the purpose of making this article readable it is to some extent, but the internet is all in agreement of the filmmaking phenomenon that is Paddington 2. 

In Peter Bradshaw’s The Guardian review, he called the film ‘a tremendously sweet-natured, charming, unassuming and above all funny film with a story that just rattles  along, powered by a nonstop succession of Grade-A gags.’ In fact, the ‘Grade-A gags’ Bradshaw refers to here is what possibly makes screenwriters Paul King, Simon Farnaby and Jon Croker’s creation so brilliant. It was the simple sequence of window cleaning that had us five students in fits of laughter. It’s hard to imagine how a bucket of water and a pulley could create comedic genius, yet it is the simplicity but effectiveness of the slapstick humour in Paddington 2, that gives it such a feel-good feeling.

 The Charlie Chaplin-esque humour alongside Hugh Grant’s convincing performance as a washed-up celebrity, had us ending the film with the disbelief but certainty that this was truly the best film any of us had ever watched. But what about these Paddington films makes them so addictive? How do they leave you with such a warm glow and a sunny perspective on life? 

One of my housemates seemed to offer the answer, stating “I think whoever wrote these films must just be the happiest person alive.” I think her comment pretty much answers these questions for me. So, in the hopes of continuing this winning streak, within 20 minutes of the end credits rolling, we had booked to see Paddington in Peru (the newly released third Paddington film) that next evening in Durham’s finest Gala  Theatre (£5.50 by the way, absolute steal).

With Paddington 2 achieving a 99% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, the film’s successor,  Paddington in Peru, was a hot topic of conversation in the industry in the build-up to its release this month. Critics were waiting in anticipation to watch the newest instalment of  Paddington’s adventures and see whether the trilogy could continue to get even better with every release. As it turns out, so were my four housemates and I as we waltzed into the Gala Theatre’s Cinema at 7.50 pm (a whole TEN minutes early for the adverts, we were that keen) with a bag stuffed full of an array of Tesco’s sweet treats.  

The third and final, for now, Paddington film follows the bear and the Brown family’s adventure to  Peru in search of his missing Aunt Lucy. The film opens strongly with a hilarious scene of  Paddington taking his passport photo, involving his polite responses to the automated speaker message, which sees him taking instructions a bit too literally and ending up in a pile of newspapers in Paddington station. We can see again how the writers are so talented in adding vibrance and humour so easily to mundane experiences we can all relate to. It seems the essence of Paddington’s character is to add light and cheer to parts of life we never thought would need it, like taking a passport photo or doing laundry, although in his case for his fellow prisoners.  

As we follow the Brown crew to Peru, we are introduced to Olivia Coleman’s  delightfully creepy character of Reverend Mother, the woman in charge of the  retirement home for bears that Aunt Lucy has mysteriously disappeared from. Her  opening musical number perfectly exhibits the ridiculous nature of her character, with  her humorously villainous smile giving away her not so inconspicuous identity. 

Ben Whishaw, of course, returns as the voice of Paddington, once again proving he is the one and only man to breathe life into this comical, good-hearted protagonist of the franchise. 

Paddington in Peru does face its challenges though, with a new ‘Mrs Brown’ as Emily Mortimer who takes over from Sally Hawkins in the role. There is also a new  director as Dougal Wilson takes charge, succeeding Paul King who directed Paddington 2. The directorial changes are notable, with reviews that do not shy away from the fact that the humour of Paddington in Peru does not quite match that of  its widely celebrated predecessor. 

Peter Bradshaw returns some seven years later to review Paddington in Peru for The Guardian, in which he comments that ‘just as jolly as the previous two films, but not really as  funny, Paddington in Peru is a sweet-natured and primary-colour family adventure  which takes Paddington Bear back to his South American homeland.’ Bradshaw, amongst other critics, says what the audience is thinking: no, it is not funnier or even as  funny as its previous film. However, that is not to say that it was not a perfectly  enjoyable experience, costing not much more than a pint in The Swan, and I would recommend watching the film to children and adults alike.

There is lots to be learnt from Hugh Bonerville’s loveable portrayal of Mr Brown. In this third instalment we see him adopt the mindset of his new American boss, Mission  Impossible’s new ‘it-girl’ Haley Atwell, and ‘embrace the risk’. Bonerville is a master of  bringing quintessential English humour to any character he touches, and in Paddington in Peru he is no different. His ‘under the breath’ comments brought a chuckle from all in the  cinema, and his fear of spiders is an aspect of his character I can greatly relate to,  although his triumph over it, is not.  

The film wraps up Paddington’s character arc in a neat and tidy bow. Whilst taking the  story out of London causes it to lose some of the humorous interactions with British  culture, it seems necessary to take Paddington beyond the space we typically see him  in and discover where our titular character comes from. 

The end of the film explores that all too important question of where do we belong? As  Paddington grapples with the duality of who he is, the cinema air is tense with  anticipation, broken with a sigh of relief as we see him once again choose London as his  home. The writers make one thing clear: You can take the bear out of London, but you can’t take London out of the bear.

Walking out of the Gala Theatre into the crisp November night, we wondered as a house at what point did we stop watching these ‘kids’ films in the cinema and concluded there comes a time when we  should all revert to these nostalgic stories.  I would urge you to take an evening and to come and fill your boots with the happiness that these types of films offer. After all, these lessons on family, adventure, and discovering things about ourselves may be  aimed at children, but I think we can all be reminded of them from time to time.