Film review: Mr Burton a stirring account of how a working-class boy became Hollywood royalty
Harry Lawtey is excellent as a crude young man in Mr Burton
★★★★☆
In 1942, your prospects as a working-class teenage boy growing up in the Welsh industrial city of Port Talbot were pretty grim: you were destined for the mines or donning a uniform to fight the Nazis.
The young Richie Jenkins (Harry Lawtey) got lucky: abandoned by his alcoholic father, raised by his sister Cis (Aimee-Ffion Edwards), Richie bonds with his English teacher (12A) over a love of Shakespeare, and glimpses an opportunity to escape, via a scholarship to Oxford, the grinding hardship his family has endured for generations.
But even the supportive Mr Burton (Toby Jones) baulks when Richie confides his dream to become an actor: Richie is simply the wrong class, with a working-man’s diction, and a name that reeks of functional poverty.
Written by Tom Bullough and Josh Hyams, and directed by Marc Evans, is a stirring account of how the gauche Richie Jenkins became Richard Burton, the most promising British actor of his generation and, eventually, Hollywood royalty.
The story beats are as expected as the clumsy, mumbling Richie graduates from muddy rugby fields to local am-dram and gradually develops that wonderfully distinctive voice and stage presence, but the film’s real strength is in the power of the performances.
Lawtey is excellent as the crude young man dazzled by Shakespearean rhythms (his mimicking of Burton’s resonant tones is impressive), while Toby Jones is superb as the creatively frustrated Svengali who is subjected to a whispering campaign that suggests his interest in the younger man is not entirely pure.
Meanwhile, Lesley Manville provides fine support as Mr Burton’s landlady and conscience, as does Aimee-Ffion Edwards as the older sister who was effectively the young Richie’s mother too. (theatrical release)
★★★★☆
(15A) stars James McArdle as Edward, a middle-aged gay man living at home and caring for his aging mother, Alma (Fionnula Flanagan), who has recently had a stroke and can only communicate, courtesy of a program on her iPad, in a metallic voice.
With his debut novel being published in the States, Edward needs to focus on himself for once – but when his friends take off to Spain for a Pride weekend, swiftly followed by his therapist Dermot (Rory O’Neill), Edward finds himself caring for their mothers too (Stella McCusker, Dearbhla Molloy and Paddy Glynn).
Darren Thornton’s remake of (2008) is a charming affair that somehow manages to be a gentle comedy that’s laugh-out-loud funny.
The story charts Edward’s emotional and creative frustrations, but it weaves them into a host of sub-plots as the older women come to terms (some more successfully than others) with the loss of their independence and agency.
McArdle is a poignantly comic presence at the heart of the action as Edward’s dutiful self-sacrifice starts to fray at the edges, and there’s excellent support from Rory O’Neill as the self-involved therapist, Dearbhla Molloy as the deliciously cynical Jean, and especially Fionnula Flanagan as the mute Alma, who steals the show with a series of robotic-sounding zingers. (theatrical release)
★★☆☆☆
(PG) stars Jack Black as the genius designer Steve, whose vivid imagination has created a cubed paradise in the Overworld dimension.
But when the evil Malgosha (Rachel House), the gold-digging ruler of Nether, steals the Orb of Dominance, Steve finds himself joining forces with a group of dimension-busting humans – Garrett (Jason Momoa), Natalie (Emma Myers), Henry (Sebastian Hansen) and Dawn (Danielle Brooks) – to save the Overworld from an invading horde of piglins, zombies and skeleton assassins.
A blend of live action and animation, promises -like thrills and spills as our heroes navigate a computer game world, but despite the best efforts of an endlessly game cast (Jack Black at his most bug-eyed manic; Jason Momoa heroically spoofing his macho persona) the plot feels cobbled together from far more enthralling epic adventures. (theatrical release)
