Grab your chamber pot m’lady! Jim O’Hanlon (TV’s The Bill & Coronation Street) and Jimmy Carr (8 out of 10 cats) do Downton Abbey, in the absurdly funny British send up, Fackham Hall.
If you enjoy The Naked Gun, you know what to expect here. Rapid fire visual and speech gags about cocks, turds, incest, norks, molestation and finger food. Set against the backdrop of ailing 1930’s aristocracy. There’s some genuine laugh out loud moments. But all up, the frequent assaults to the funny bone blend in to each other and it becomes a predictable snooze.
Co-written by Steve and Andrew Dawson, Tim Inman and Patrick Carr. The drama is simple and unoriginal. The Davenports need to marry off their spinster daughter, to some bloke with money in order to save their estate. So her own cousin (Tom Felton) shows up and spends the rest of the film acting like an inept brat, so that we all hate him (again). Competing with cousin awful, is nobody Eric, who showed up by accident.
It’s Wuthering Heights meets Jimmy Carr standup. It’s crass, unsophisticated and maybe a little boring. With a climax plot twist that’s obvious from the beginning. What’s interesting though, is the choice to weave more than a few modern pop culture twists through key moments. These gags come off cute and break up the monotony.
Ben Radcliffe (Masters of the Air) as Eric, Thomasin McKenzie (Last Night in Soho) as Rose and old empty eyes Tim McMullan (Red Sonja) as Cyril do most of the heavy lifting. Just slightly elevating their scenes beyond late night skit comedy. Everyone else is just annoying. It would have been nice to see Jimmy Carr playing a more prominent character and flexing more of his delivery. As it is, there’s not much of him in this one.
In summary, Fackham Hall is an ambitious cinematic comedy that’s riding on the credentials of a co-writer with a bit part, rather than bringing anything fresh or clever to the genre. It’s not the worst. Just extremely mediocre. A meagre 6/10 cats, in my opinion. Unless you’re a big fan of Antiques Roadshow, I’d wait for streaming.
