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The Critic

There is an awful lot happening in The Critic, on screen and off. Ian McKellen is the central pivot as snobby theatre critic, Jimmy Erskine, his venomous pen the scourge of many playwrights and actors in 1934 London. The film is based on an Anthony Quinn (not that one) novel called Curtain Call, with apparently one whole plotline (about a serial killer) removed. Patrick Marber (screenwriter of Closer and Notes on a Scandal, as well as many other stage and TV credits) clearly decided to jettison that particular thread in favour of focussing on Erskine and the other players, including Gemma Arterton's actress Nina Land and Mark Strong's Viscount David Brooke, who has just taken proprietorship of the newspaper Jimmy writes for, The Chronicle.

Brooke doesn't really approve of Erskine's writing style, or lifestyle (he's a vaguely closeted gay man who likes a bit of 'rough trade'), so he's under pressure to keep his nose clean. But a scathing, nasty review of Land in her new play brings the first warning, swiftly followed by an arrest for outraging public decency. Erskine is dismissed. Of course, he takes umbrage and plots a honey trap of Brooke using Land as the flower. Betrayals, deceit, and the inevitable death complete the story. It's a surprisingly uneven script from Marber, especially the dialogue - there are some absolute crackers, mixed in with some really clunky stuff. Anand Tucker's direction cleverly lets the performers get on with it and the set design of 1920s London looks suitably austere (and not vast enough to stretch the presumably small budget - after the cast had all been paid, obviously).

Accordingly, the strength of The Critic is in its cast. McKellen's face is so haggard now that it almost operates in different time zones. His facial geography is unaligned, each quadrant doing its own thing at any given moment. Fascinating work. In one scene, Jimmy tells Nina how to act in certain situations and it reminded me of McKellen's great little 'Sir Ian, sir Ian, sir Ian...' bit in Extras. Arterton is also on top form. It must be hard for actors to play 'bad', as she had to do in the first couple of plays, but not ham it up too much. Still waiting for a role where she can show her full range - she's better than most of the stuff she's in. And Strong is probably best on the pitch. He always brings class but here it's gravitas that he leads with, and he's fantastic, in a very unflashy way.

There are some excellent actors that flesh out the film - Romola Garai, Lesley Manville, Alfred Enoch and Ron Cook amongst them - and David Higgs' cinematography is full of style. The whole film comes off as a bit melodramatic, though, and it teetered on the brink of farce throughout. It felt tonally askew for the most part, but the performances hold the attention when you're wondering if it's going to stay on the rails or not.

A couple of side notes: this was produced by (and dedicated to) ex-Everton FC chairman, Bill Kenwright, who passed away in October 2023. And could this be the last film I see at the beautiful old Windsor Cinema in Nedlands? There's some talk that the owners (not Luna Palace Cinemas, who lease the building) are looking to offload it, marketing the land as having "high density large density future redevelopment options". Hopefully, a campaign to have it heritage listed works out, otherwise it could be the end of this iconic building.

The Critic opens on Oct 3rd at Luna and Palace cinemas.

See also:

You'll find some similarities in Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), and more still in François Ozon's The Crime is Mine (2023).

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