Dough - and The 100-Foot Journey

We caught up with a 2015 movie last night called (simply) Dough. As in cash, of course, and in actual dough for baking.

It's a story about an elderly Jewish baker in London whose business is losing customers and money. The shops on either side are either owned or being bought out by an unscrupulous former 'barrow boy.' Through various circumstances a young African Muslim boy becomes the Jew's apprentice baker and things begin to turn around. Of course there are difficulties and troubles along the way. 

It's a comedy, for the most part, and the kind of necessary violence in it is kept to a minimum. 

A number of critics have pooh-poohed the film as being predictable (it is, as much as any film might be), and because it doesn't tackle the real issues of what might be involved in a Jew and a Muslim working together. For these critics, things are too simple. 

Of course they are. It's a comedy, not a film by Ken Loach or one of his ilk. Of course there are improbabilities, and even a considerable loophole in the plot - if you stop and think about it later. But there's also considerable joy in places, warmth, and some well-performed characters, especially Jonathan Pryce as the baker. Jerome Holder is the African immigrant, and I found his performance full of contrasts; he was well able to stand up to the more seasoned actors around him, such as Pauline Collins, as the recently-widowed landlady of the baker's shop, and Phil Harris and Ian Hart (neither of them chosen for their good looks) as the two villains. 

It's not a film that'll change the world. It's a feel-good movie, but seemingly many critics these days think that feel-good movies shouldn't be allowed to stand alongside the blockbusters, the Marvel comic adaptations, the deeply serious art movies. And the foreign movies, including the foreign comedies - wait, most of those are also feel-good movies, but they have subtitles...!

You can see Dough on Netflix.

21.6.17 Also on Netflix is The Hundred-Foot Journey. 

It's the story of an Indian family of cooks making good opposite a Michelin star restaurant in a relatively small town in France. They manage to do this in spite of Helen Mirren being the owner of the French restaurant, a place where 'classic' food is served. There should be no contest, except that one of the sons of the Indian restaurant happens to be a cooking genius.

I'd avoided seeing this previously because it got poor critical reviews. But it turns out to be another feel-good movie, beautifully filmed (the food looks wonderful, and the mouth waters) and well-acted. The script might be a bit undercooked, but the overall effect is enjoyment and delight.

There are some oddities: the French characters often speak French at the beginning of a scene but then wind up shifting into accented English. The Indians speak accented English throughout (though of course with a different accent). Both the restaurants are well-out of town: you wouldn't walk to either of them, yet they both have a good clientele.

Anyway, relax and enjoy it. Some films exist for no other reason.

Whistle Down the Wind

The film, Whistle Down the Wind, turned up in The Warehouse’s bargain DVDs this weekend, along with Tiger Bay and another similar movie, all in one package. I saw Tiger Bay when it first came out, but hadn’t ever seen this later Hayley Mills’ movie.
It’s a wonderful small-scale piece in which three young siblings who live on a farm discover a man hiding in their father’s barn, and come to believe he’s Jesus. The implications for the children, and the other village children, and the man himself, are profound. And even though we know the man isn’t Jesus, we understand the children’s belief and their theological questioning, and appreciate why they think the way they do.
The film would be nothing without the integrity of the two younger children and a number of others who are so much part of the landscape that everything about them is believable. Hayley Mills is very good, being almost the only child with previous film experience, but she doesn’t quite belong in this environment the way the other kids do. That’s not to say she doesn’t play the part well; Mills always had a sincerity and genuineness that transcended everything else about the films she appeared in. She was a natural screen performer and deserved the accolades she got.
The film plays out almost entirely on a real farm, where the slush and mud is authentic, the buildings are as old as they look, and the craggy trees and the winter sunshine are bleak but not unbeautiful. Even though the interiors were mostly shot at Pinewood Studios, they match the exteriors well.
The story is moving, but more than anything it’s the faces of the children that are so wonderful. These Northern kids for the most part went back to their normal lives, but you’d think they’d been working in movies since the day they were born. There’s not a drop of ‘acting’ anywhere. Diane Holgate as Hayley Mills’ younger sister has that Northern stance and way of looking that was still visible on Coronation St up until a few years ago. Alan Barnes lives the part from beginning to end: the irritating little brother, the child angrily questioning Jesus as to why he didn’t keep his kitten alive, the innocent little boy quite capable of facing up to his perpetually annoyed aunt, the birthday boy demanding that his game be played because it’s his birthday.
There’s another boy in it whose face, the moment it appeared, was familiar. So strong are his features that they didn’t change a jot as he progressed into adulthood. While I wouldn’t have known his name, Roy Holder, it’s interesting to see that he’s been going strong ever since Whistle Down the Wind was made.
And then there are a host of other children: reality written all over them.
Bernard Miles, Norman Bird and Alan Bates are the main adult characters, and fit in with the milieu well.