A drawing room, period, study of manners, domestic drama, if you will... The drama is admittedly light, centring on the impact of a teenage son's expulsion from naval college and the truth or otherwise of this occurrence. Strangely enough, you never get to learn whether the boy was actually guilty or not of his "crime" - although he gets off, it's never fully resolved and could be attributed to the superior advocacy of his attorney - sadly still a predilection in modern society. However the dramatic content could have been increased with some kind of courtroom climax, or confession, but now I'm arguing with the original play, hardly the fault of David Mamet or his actors. The Edwardian, pre War "golden - era" is nicely evoked with the big house, coterie of servants and upper - class manners of the family, although contemporary influences such as suffragetism (strongly) and the approaching war (mildly) are referred to. I'm not sure Mamet properly and fully brought home the "sensational" aspect of the Winslow case on the British public, even as I appreciated his subtlety in demonstrating this via newspaper hoardings, contemporary cartoons and the like. He does however marshall his acting troupe well. Nigel Hawthorne shines as the patriarch who sacrifices the wants and needs of his wider family for the sake of clearing his son's name. I didn't get the impression that it was the family name he was defending and genuinely believe it was for his youngest son's future which concerned him, which is as it should be. I'm not quite sure however that Hawthorne seems just too old to have fathered the boy. The rest of the cast play very well although some of their roles seem stereotypical and perhaps more could have been made of the interfamily tensions...but again that takes us back to Rattigan's source material. Mamet this time, quite rightly eschews all opportunity to contemporise the play and his cinematic devices are subtly reined in, no overlapping dialogue or sharp cross-cutting here. I liked the utilisation of the swinging garden gate at the start of the film, letting in the "bad" from outside, which recalled to mind J.B. Priestley's "An Inspector Calls". How often English dramatists seemed to write about the so called idyllic society of the upper classes breaking down...nothing lasts forever it seems. Anyway, in summary, a wordy piece, well shot, well played but ultimately probably best enjoyed as a stage play.
Review of The Winslow Boy
