Allelujah

Do not get me wrong, the movie has funny bits and pieces, but I do not believe it is meant to be a funny movie. It is more a harsh reflection on healthcare and how we treat our elderly. But for me it did not get too dark, I also enjoyed it very much.

Jennifer Saunders really has grown as an actress I think. We know she can do funny, but in this more serious role she blossoms as well.

However, do you wanna watch because of dame Judy Dench, do not get your hopes up too much. She has a smaller part and for me a bit too small and on the side.

Overall, very well acted. If you are not English I recommend decent subtitles.

When a small geriatric hospital in Northern England is threatened with closure, the staff and patients rally together to try and save it. There might be a glimmer of hope with this task as the government consultant tasked with the final evaluation - "Colin" (Russell Tovey) has his estranged father " Joe" (David Bradley) in that self same facility. The place is run under the benignly imperious hand of "Sister Gilpin" (Jennifer Saunders) with Bally Gill's "Dr. Valentine" tending to their clinical needs. As you'd expect with Alan Bennett, this comes at you from the left of the political spectrum, and highlights what he sees as the short-termism of fiscally based decision making. To that end, Sir Richard Eyre has assembled a strong cast of formidable character actors to portray the patients. Most notable amongst them, for me, was Julia McKenzie and Bradley is also on great form as the curmudgeonly old gent coming to terms with his predicament and his successful, gay, son. There is plenty of dry humour, observational sarcasm to the fore and Saunders and Gill have quite a nice chemistry between them as they both strive to care for their elderly charges. I can't say that I loved the ending. It is thought provoking, but somehow seemed just a little over-dramatic and unnecessary. That said, though, the ensemble cast reminded me very much "Quartet" (2012) with strong leading characters and familiar faces at every turn helping to highlight the serious (and lighter) issues of the ageing process for both the older folks and for those charged with keeping them well. Not sure it really needs a cinema to enjoy, but it's still well worth ninety minutes.

On the positive side, the acting was great. I particularly liked Jennifer Saunders' portrayal of a dedicated, no-nonsense ward sister, and David Bradley's retired miner. The underlying message of the threat to the NHS by those that don't understand its core values is an important one. But this film was not the way to make that point.

Although, as you'd expect with a strong cast, the acting was great, many of the characters were tediously stereotyped: the charming Asian doctor who 'loved old people', the bubbly, enthusiastic nurse, a range of old people who used Alan Bennett one-liners to establish themselves as sweetly eccentric, away with the fairies, or curmudgeonly in a loveable way. You could tell just by the body language that the children of an old lady were up to no good and just wanted to fleece her. The son of the miner who had gone South to forge a successful career as a management consultant was predictably transformed from an over-confident critic of the hospital to a supporter.

The setting was not so much stereotyped as confusing. The threatened hospital did have one doctor, one nurse, a sister, and a physiotherapist, and some of the patients were sick - indeed the plot hinged on a character who was worried that if he improved he'd be sent back to a nursing home. But most of the activities that we saw suggested that the institution was a care home - the old people seemed to be long-term residents and were well enough to shuffle around doing craft activities and reminiscence therapy. A film crew from the local paper were drifting around interviewing residents. It was as if the original intention was to make a film about a care home, but they then realised that if they wanted the message to be about the NHS, they needed to make it into a hospital.

I won't include spoilers but just to say that just when you think this is going to be a totally saccharine experience, where the struggling hospital will be saved from closure, there is a plot twist that acts like a hand grenade in derailing all expectations. It might have worked if the rest of the film had been more believable, but it seemed totally unsatisfactory in the context of the rest of the film.

And then, at the end we have bolted on a section where the nice doctor is now in a covid ward, making a heartfelt plea for the continuation of the NHS, while showing devastating scenes of patients in corridors, and exhausted staff in PPE struggling to cope. I found myself wishing that Ken Loach had made a film on this theme: that would have been far more effective than this clunky treatment.

There are some plot twists you can see coming a mile off. There are many films where you know a twist is coming, even if you don't know what it'll be. Allelujah is a film where you don't realise there's going to be a twist t all, never mind one so vicious.

Set in a small, crumbling hospital earmarked for closure, and which mostly deals with geriatric patients, Allelujah starts out as a classic Little Guy vs Government Machine story. There's much that is poignant, and much that is comic and there are fine performances throughout, particularly from Jennifer Saunders, David Bradley and Derek Jacobi.

Then, just when the bureaucrat seems set for a big change of heart and the audience senses the feel-good ending, the rug's pulled out from under them completely. It's both devastating and unforgettable.

Dr Valentine's final piece to camera is magnificent, as he says the things that *need* to be said.

As is often the case - I simply dont understand the low-scores by Imdb contributors. A score starting with a 5 on here is completely unjustified.

This is - perhaps at first sight - a boring film full of old doddery figures. There are no car chases - no screeching of wheels - no guns in fact or any raised voices threatening anyone with anything. Perhaps whats whats "wrong" here.

Instead there are many threads of peoples varied lives all ending up (as most readers of this will - if they are lucky) in their twilight years under the care of The NHS - their for our first breath and our last.

There is a completely unexpected plot twist near the ending - makes one think "Is this based on a true story" and then you remember the genius of the Writer Alan Bennetts fiction over decades here in the UK.

Its brilliant. Have some curiosity and give it a go.