Monday 4 September 2023

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry (2023 Hettie Macdonald)

An unlikely premise - if you wanted to be with your dying friend, you'd want to get there as quickly as you could, wouldn't you? (But I've seen much more unlikely things, such as in the films of Tarkovsky.) So let's put that aside, and see it as a state-of-the-nation piece, but primarily an emotional journey in which the ambulatorist (if such a word exists) Jim Broadbent reexamines his relationship with suicide son (and wife Penelope Wilton). Enjoyed it.

Notable for its female presence in that the screenplay is by Rachel Joyce, adapted from her own novel, and the DP (Kate McCullogh), production designer, costumes, sets, makeup etc are all female (though disappointingly, the editors are male - imagine what Vic Boydell would have done with this material!)

With Earl Cave (the son), Monika Gossman (toilet cleaning doctor), Linda Bassett, Daniel Frogson, Naomi Wirthner, Claire Rushbrook, Andrew Leung, Joy Richardson (hospice nurse).


This 'sun gun' lighting is a feature of the flashbacks with the son


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