REVIEWS
64 | Sight&Sound | November 2019
Reviewed by Kate Stables
Anyone seeking potent big-screen analgesia
in these troubled times need look no further
than the cosy, highly crafted escapism of the
Downton Abbey movie. Creator Julian Fellowes’s
ITV period melodrama provided a similarly
comforting, nostalgic distraction from the
Great Recession during its wildly successful
2010-15 run. The historian Simon Schama
may have damned it as a “steaming, silvered
tureen of snobbery”, but the aristo-soap antics
of the Earl of Grantham’s family and servants
built a vast and loyal international following.
So, unsurprisingly, this theatrical sequel forms
a suitably sumptuous capper to the TV series, free
of the cynicism and class-conflict of Fellowes’s
Oscar-winning country-house caper Gosford Park
(2001). More of a supersized TV special than a
standalone feature, its carefully contained tale of a
royal visit, roiled by staff unrest and a family feud,
is designed to tweak rather than supplant previous
storylines. Fellowes’s self-assured script, following
soon after the show’s 1926-set finale, opts for a
spread of TV-style subplots doled out across the
film’s large ensemble cast. Layered like a trifle,
these low-stakes stories cram in a disputed minor
inheritance, a Downton servants revolt against
haughty royal staff, plumbing disasters and a
mystery pilferer. But it’s all thin stuff, seeming
even thinner when stretched over a big screen,
handsomely mounted settings and a two-hour
span. Even the one hint of real jeopardy, a threat to
King George V, is sketched and despatched with
unseemly haste. Where’s the meaty melodrama
that sustained six series of star-crossed and
class-crossed romances, sudden deaths, secret
children and battalions of blackmailers?
Banished, in favour of the importance of ‘the
done thing’, the demanding protocol and pomp
of a royal visit providing a testing challenge
for Downton to shine as a united household.
Director Michael Engler’s voluptuous visuals
linger on the sunlit pageantry of a Yorkshire
Hussars parade, Highclere Castle’s lush
landscapes and glowing interiors buffed to a
high shine by an army of servants giddy with
royalist fervour (republicanism gets a cautious
below-stairs mention). A stately, glistening
spectacle of pre-war grandeur, lit up by Anna
Robbins’s glittering flapper dresses, the film
eschews the rocky ruling-class predicament
of the 1920s in favour of arch nods at history.
“My maid was rather curt with me – but she’s
a communist at heart” is Violet, Dowager
Countess Grantham’s take on the general strike.
There’s no shortage of zingers from Maggie
Smith, Downton’s MVP, feuding with Imelda
Staunton’s stern Lady Bagshaw in a clash of
the tiara-wearing titans that is fun if flagrant
fan service. Hugh Bonneville and other
series stalwarts make the best of sparse plot
rations with easy, confident playing, with
only David Haig’s smilingly poisonous royal
butler registering among the newcomers.
Themes of hallowed tradition versus necessary
progress are teased out in the trademark Downton
mix of social liberalism and one-nation Tory
paternalism, allowing for the heartwarming if
anachronistic acceptance of an illegitimate child
and a gay storyline for lonely butler Barrow.
But maid Anna’s stirring defence of ‘noblesse
oblige’ – dismissing Lady Mary’s weary thoughts
of selling the house because “Downton is
the heart of this community” – is designed to
reassure the viewer as much as the chatelaine.
A wallow in the lavish living and moral
certainties of Downton’s shiny imagined past,
Fellowes and Engler’s film creates a vision of
a politically and socially secure Great Britain
that has rarely seemed further out of reach.
Downton Abbey
USA/People’s Republic of China/United Kingdom 2019
Director: Michael Engler
Certificate PG 122m 16s
Downton Abbey country estate, Yorkshire, 1927. The
Crawley family and their servants are galvanised by
news of a royal visit. Violet, Dowager Countess of
Grantham, insists that her cousin Maud Bagshaw, the
queen’s lady-in-waiting, make Lord Grantham her heir,
not Maud’s beloved maid Lucy. Crawley son-in-law
and Irish republican Tom Branson assumes that he is
under surveillance by the palace’s ‘Captain Chetwode’,
in reality an undercover assassin. Tom foils Chetwode’s
attempt to kill King George. Tom is attracted to Lucy.
The Downton staff rebel against the haughty royal
servants, hoaxing them so that they can serve the royal
dinner themselves. Footman Molesley makes a gaffe,
but is forgiven. Butler Barrow is arrested in a York gay
club, but released thanks to the king’s sympathetic
valet. When confronted, Maud confesses that Lucy
is her illegitimate child. Lady Mary decides against
selling Downton Abbey after maid Anna insists it is
the heart of the local community. At the ball, Violet
relents regarding Lucy’s inheritance, hoping that Tom
will marry Lucy. Violet tells Lady Mary that she is dying,
but is happy that Mary will protect Downton Abbey.
Produced by
Gareth Neame
Julian Fellowes
Liz Trubridge
Screenplay
Julian Fellowes
Based on the
television series
created by Julian
Fellowes and
produced by
Carnival Films
Director of
Photography
Ben Smithard
Edited by
Mark Day
Production Designer
Donal Woods
Music
John Lunn
Production
Sound Mixer
David Lascelles
Costume Designer
Anna Robbins
© Focus Features LLC
and Perfect Universe
Investment Inc.
Production
Companies
Focus Features
presents in
association with
Perfect World
Pictures a Carnival
Films production
Executive Producers
Nigel Marchant
Brian Percival
Cast
Hugh Bonneville
Robert Crawley,
Lord Grantham
Laura Carmichael
Lady Edith Hexham
Jim Carter
Mr Carson
Raquel Cassidy
Miss Baxter
Brendan Coyle
Mr Bates
Michelle Dockery
Lady Mary Talbot
Kevin Doyle
Mr Molesley
Michael Fox
Andy
Joanne Froggatt
Anna Bates
Matthew Goode
Henry Talbot
Harry Hadden-Paton
Lord Hexham, ‘Bertie’
Robert James-Collier
Thomas Barrow
Allen Leech
Tom Branson
Phyllis Logan
Mrs Hughes
Elizabeth McGovern
Cora Crawley,
Lady Grantham
Sophie McShera
Daisy
Lesley Nicol
Mrs Patmore
Maggie Smith
Violet Crawley, the
Dowager Countess
of Grantham
Imelda Staunton
Maud Bagshaw
Penelope Wilton
Isobel Merton
Mark Addy
Mr Bakewell
Max Brown
Richard Ellis
Stephen Campbell
Moore
Major Chetwode
David Haig
Mr Wilson
Geraldine James
Queen Mary
Simon Jones
King George V
Susan Lynch
Miss Lawton
Tuppence Middleton
Lucy Smith
Kate Phillips
Princess Mary
Douglas Reith
Lord Merton
Dolby Atmos
In Colour
[2.35:1]
Distributor
Universal Pictures
International
UK & Eire
Credits and Synopsis
Shall Come is caught between knowing
satirical sophistication and its tendency
to wayward absurdism, leaving both aspects
of its comedy more than a little fogged.
In addition, the editing has a somewhat
dreamy, disconnected rhythm that slackens the
narrative drive. The result is a film that feels
rather like a rough sketch for the sort of satire
that US directors such as Steven Soderbergh or
Barry Levinson take in their stride. There is also
the nagging worry that, despite Morris’s obvious
rage about systematic oppression policies, we
are nevertheless watching a white English
humorist having fun with a spectacular form of
African-American eccentricity. Fortunately, the
tenderness and charisma that Marchánt Davis
and especially Danielle Brooks bring to the roles
of Moses and his wife Venus give them a three-
dimensionality that transcends caricature. Given
his political good intentions, you could only
really accuse Morris, at worst, of exoticising these
characters; even so, you can’t help wondering
how Spike Lee would view this film.
Miami, present day. Moses al Shabaz, a young
African-American preacher, runs the Star of
Six community farm and mission and teaches a
revolutionary creed to a tiny band of followers.
They are under observation by an FBI sting
operation, which uses ‘informants’ – ie agents
provocateurs – to target people suspected of
terrorist intent and persuade them to perform
incriminating acts so that they can be arrested.
Short of money and threatened with eviction,
Moses is approached by informers Reza and Nura,
the latter posing as a sheikh. They offer Moses
$50,000 to arm them with guns; he accepts, causing
his wife Venus to leave him in protest. Moses visits
FBI agent Kendra Glack, asking for money to inform
on himself; she realises that he is harmless, but the
sting operation goes ahead. Moses is persuaded to
make a deal with a white supremacist biker gang
- in reality, undercover cops – to sell them nuclear
material, but instead gives them containers filled
with beans and urine. Moses attends his daughter’s
birthday party at a diner, and is arrested by security
forces, along with Venus and his followers.
Producers
Iain Canning
Emile Sherman
Anne Carey
Chris Morris
Derrin Schlesinger
Written by
Chris Morris
Jesse Armstrong
Director of
Photography
Marcel Zyskind
Editor
Billy Sneddon
Production
Designer
Lucio Seixas
Music
Jonathan Whitehead
Sebastian Rochford
Chris Morris
Costume Designer
Marci Rodgers
Production
Companies
IFC Films, Film4,
Riverstone Pictures
and BFI present
in association
with FilmNation
Entertainment
and Cross City
Films a See-Saw
Films and Perp &
Co production
Produced in
association with
Archer Gray
A Chris Morris film
Developed in
association
with Film4
Made with the
support of the
BFI’s Film Fund
Executive
Producers
Daniel Battsek
Sue Bruce-Smith
Tessa Ross
Mary Burke
Nik Bower
Deepak Nayar
David Kosse
Jennifer Roth
Amy Nauiokas
Cast
Marchánt Davis
Moses al Shabazz
Anna Kendrick
Kendra Glack
Danielle Brooks
Venus
Kayvan Novak
Reza
Denis O’Hare
Andy, FBI boss
Jim Gaffigan
Lemmy
Pej Vahdat
Nura
Calah Lane
Rosa
James Adomian
In Colour
[1.85:1]
Distributor
Entertainment One
Credits and Synopsis
A RT
PRODUCTION
CLIENT
SUBS
REPRO OP
VERSION
Reviews, 7
