Produced for the BBC, this fascinating film based upon the Prix Italia screenplay of Simon Gray offers a great deal to enjoy, thanks essentially to seamless control of the narrative, along with correctly sustained tension, by director Christopher Morahan. When James Westgate (Bob Peck), a rather restrained Oxford academic, is introduced to the spouse of newly hired faculty member Derek (Barry Foster), James recognizes her as the close companion of his childhood, Penelope or "Patch" (Miranda Richardson), for whom he holds a long nurtured and private adoration, as the script artfully depicts with careful detailing. As children, Patch led and the once plump James, or "Porker", had followed, often into situations that involved a degree of risk and, upon renewal of their relationship, Westgate discovers that he is glad to resume their former order, albeit of a yet more lively nature. For it seems that a local archaeologist, one Pilkington, often taken to seeking after artifacts within woods upon the property of Derek and Penny, has disappeared, and Patch and Porker once again pool their efforts, resulting in anxious interludes that are combined into dramatic coherence by director Morahan. The cleverly constructed script by Gray is largely responsible for the disparate categorical components included within the film, among which are humour, whimsy, romance, satire, drama and adventure, in addition to some tangibly suspenseful sequences. One can not but be pleased with the gripping performances by Richardson, whose entire physical being seems to be channeled into her role, and by Peck, whose uniquely diffident persona provides a mirror for Gray's finesse, in addition to polished turns from supporting players Foster and Gary Waldhorn as a close friend of the other three. Schubert's Quintet in A, op. 114. "Trout", a significant factor in the storyline of a film that is shot in and about Oxford, is played well by Oxford based musicians and beautifully balanced and integrated during the post-production process, and there is also valuable understated but illustrative additional scoring from Stephen Oliver, while the camera-work of cinematographer Stephen Dunn is ably employed to induce the buffet of moods. After repeated viewings, it becomes clear that this complex item is both rich and strange while, to complete the analogy, a climactic scene is echoic of the Jacobean.
5 Reviews
A Heart in the Mouth in Worth Two Feet in the Grave
gengar84311 October 2023
Warning: Spoilers
For those who believe that true love is assisting a homicidal maniac while simultaneously trying to commit adultery, all in the name of wistful nostalgia, and in the process wrecking one's perfectly good life that includes professorship at Oxford. Still with me?
The performances are superb, although to be honest I felt the script stilted, as if someone was copying Hitchcock without being Hitchcock, and the presence of Barry Foster, the lead in Hitchcock's FRENZY, adds to this suspicion, as if some further cachet were needed to seal the viewer deal. What's wrong with the script? I know it's made-for-(British)-TV, but the ending is quite rushed after all the red herrings and relationship conversations were set in place. Was it clever anyway? OK, I didn't think Miranda was going to be QUITE so insane, but I knew it wasn't going to end well. How could it?
The plot goes under the heading "watch out for living the past" along with "keep to your own business." OK, OK, so Westgate (Peck) wanted a little excitement in his life? No? Then he should've scrammed when he saw the scissors in Pilkington's neck. No? You say true love conquers all? Westgate isn't even married to her, so he has no vested interest to protect her, other than he wants a few more minutes (or a lifetime) with "Patch". It's very anti-hierarchy also, somewhat subversive in saying that Oxford produces this bunch, with chloroform and attachments.
Hey, I watched the whole thing, and I felt my anger at Peck turning to sadness for him, and then for us all as humans. Does that mean good filmmaking, that I can feel feelings? Eh, I feel awe on the 27th viewing of PREDATOR, and joy on the 100th viewing of THE SANTA CLAUSE. So you make the call.
The performances are superb, although to be honest I felt the script stilted, as if someone was copying Hitchcock without being Hitchcock, and the presence of Barry Foster, the lead in Hitchcock's FRENZY, adds to this suspicion, as if some further cachet were needed to seal the viewer deal. What's wrong with the script? I know it's made-for-(British)-TV, but the ending is quite rushed after all the red herrings and relationship conversations were set in place. Was it clever anyway? OK, I didn't think Miranda was going to be QUITE so insane, but I knew it wasn't going to end well. How could it?
The plot goes under the heading "watch out for living the past" along with "keep to your own business." OK, OK, so Westgate (Peck) wanted a little excitement in his life? No? Then he should've scrammed when he saw the scissors in Pilkington's neck. No? You say true love conquers all? Westgate isn't even married to her, so he has no vested interest to protect her, other than he wants a few more minutes (or a lifetime) with "Patch". It's very anti-hierarchy also, somewhat subversive in saying that Oxford produces this bunch, with chloroform and attachments.
Hey, I watched the whole thing, and I felt my anger at Peck turning to sadness for him, and then for us all as humans. Does that mean good filmmaking, that I can feel feelings? Eh, I feel awe on the 27th viewing of PREDATOR, and joy on the 100th viewing of THE SANTA CLAUSE. So you make the call.
Disturbing and darkly funny
myriamlenys20 August 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Once upon a time there was a timid boy who liked being bossed around by a more kooky and adventurous girl nicknamed "Patch". Now a fully grown man - and an Oxford professor to boot - he runs into his old playmate again. It turns out that Patch/Penelope is married to a rather self-centered academic. It also turns out that she is in a great big heap of trouble...
It isn't easy to put a name on the genre to which "After Pilkington" belongs. Probably "a mix of crime drama, satire and black comedy" comes closest. The plot, which seems rambling and free-wheeling at first, is actually cleverly assembled. Seemingly disparate elements like homosexuality, adultery, animal experimentation, intellectual patronage and donnish gossip are cunningly combined into a cautionary tale about the dangers of rekindling relationships that should have stayed in the past. The outcome is both horrifying and logical.
Set in and around Oxford, "After Pilkington" also delivers a satirical condemnation of the academic world. You sort of hope, say, that professors well-versed in Classical philosophy, Jacobean poetry or Persian history would become deep wells of wisdom but naah, they're fully capable of lying, backstabbing and philandering. The ranks of the learned don't constitute a finer class of people ; it's just the sherry that gets more expensive.
The acting is good and Miranda Richardson delivers sterling work as a woman of far too many parts.
It isn't easy to put a name on the genre to which "After Pilkington" belongs. Probably "a mix of crime drama, satire and black comedy" comes closest. The plot, which seems rambling and free-wheeling at first, is actually cleverly assembled. Seemingly disparate elements like homosexuality, adultery, animal experimentation, intellectual patronage and donnish gossip are cunningly combined into a cautionary tale about the dangers of rekindling relationships that should have stayed in the past. The outcome is both horrifying and logical.
Set in and around Oxford, "After Pilkington" also delivers a satirical condemnation of the academic world. You sort of hope, say, that professors well-versed in Classical philosophy, Jacobean poetry or Persian history would become deep wells of wisdom but naah, they're fully capable of lying, backstabbing and philandering. The ranks of the learned don't constitute a finer class of people ; it's just the sherry that gets more expensive.
The acting is good and Miranda Richardson delivers sterling work as a woman of far too many parts.
Droll, inventive inversion of a murder mystery
lor_7 April 2024
Famous for his play "Butley", made memorable by Alan Bates' performance on both stage and film, writer Simon Gray concocted this highly original film for British television that manages to integrate elements of 1930s screwball comedy into veddy veddy British dark humor.
It's set in Oxford, with an everyman antihero played (and underplayed marvelously) by Bob Peck. Gray present a series of unusual coincidences and predicaments involving unsuspecting prof Peck and in so doing lays bare how traditional mysteries rely upon the viewer believing almost anything happening, no matter how outlandish it might seem at first glance, and how lying compounds the problems that accelerate in dizzying fashion. It's not credible, but delightfully strange, and with the performances of the three leading characters highly entertaining. Barry Foster (memorable in Hitchcock's "Frenzy") and the exceptionally versatile Miranda Richardson, play another Oxford prof and his wife with whom Peck becomes inextricably bound up in both amusing and scary developments. To say anything more about what happens to them would surely spoil the fun.
Gray has planted drastic plot twists at key points, with the most major one turning the final reel into another genre entirely. But by then I was fully caught up in the plight of these fictional characters and willing to let Gray take them into uncharted territory.
It's set in Oxford, with an everyman antihero played (and underplayed marvelously) by Bob Peck. Gray present a series of unusual coincidences and predicaments involving unsuspecting prof Peck and in so doing lays bare how traditional mysteries rely upon the viewer believing almost anything happening, no matter how outlandish it might seem at first glance, and how lying compounds the problems that accelerate in dizzying fashion. It's not credible, but delightfully strange, and with the performances of the three leading characters highly entertaining. Barry Foster (memorable in Hitchcock's "Frenzy") and the exceptionally versatile Miranda Richardson, play another Oxford prof and his wife with whom Peck becomes inextricably bound up in both amusing and scary developments. To say anything more about what happens to them would surely spoil the fun.
Gray has planted drastic plot twists at key points, with the most major one turning the final reel into another genre entirely. But by then I was fully caught up in the plight of these fictional characters and willing to let Gray take them into uncharted territory.
Old acquaintance leads to becoming an accessory.
mark.waltz25 January 2021
Warning: Spoilers
A bit of subtle dark comedy takes over this sly intellectual drama about the reunion of childhood crushes Bob Peck and Miranda Richardson, the wife of one of his colleagues, a newcomer at Oxford. This leads to various confessions, one that a poor student has a crush on him, two that his colleague is perplexed by phrases involving "cats" (Cat's pajamas, Cat's whiskers, stuff like that...), and the fact that Richardson was responsible for the death of another acquaintance, Pinkerton, his body found in his car which has been sitting abandoned for days.
Not so much a plotline as a series of weird events that take over the staid life of Peck who takes everything with ease even the confession of his student who can't come up with a term paper because he is afraid of being judged by the man he loved. The plot involving Pilkington itself isn't as interesting as getting to know these characters. There are more than just a few gay references here with another gay colleague revealing to him that some of the staff thinks that Peck is the man in his life. Interesting for a look at life among British intellectuals as a character study and how making an old acquaintance a new friend isn't always a good idea. Richardson, one of England's best character actresses, proves again that she can completely disappear into a role and you won't even recognize her.
Not so much a plotline as a series of weird events that take over the staid life of Peck who takes everything with ease even the confession of his student who can't come up with a term paper because he is afraid of being judged by the man he loved. The plot involving Pilkington itself isn't as interesting as getting to know these characters. There are more than just a few gay references here with another gay colleague revealing to him that some of the staff thinks that Peck is the man in his life. Interesting for a look at life among British intellectuals as a character study and how making an old acquaintance a new friend isn't always a good idea. Richardson, one of England's best character actresses, proves again that she can completely disappear into a role and you won't even recognize her.
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