My Lady

Never before have I gone to a screening of a film just to see if it was going to be just OK, in fact I nearly didn't go. How wrong I was, I cannot remember a film that has has such an emotional impact on me. It's a very powerful intelligent and moving film with stunning performances from Emma Thompson & Fionn Whitehead and if Emma doesn't receive awards for her performance alone then there's something seriously wrong. If you like intelligent thought provoking films, go and watch this on the big screen, I promise you'll not be disappointed.

This film starts off engaging, as the judge is presented with a dilemma that would spark a controversy whichever way she decides to do. The courtroom drama is interesting and makes me want to find out what is next. However, the second half of the film is just really strange and uninteresting. It is far fetched, overly sentimental and plainly unbelievable. The second half spoils the experience for me.

Judge Maye (Thompson) is a childless wife to her loving husband Jack (Tucci), but is also a workaholic. This is driving the long-term couple to the point of infidelity: a fact the ever-focused Fiona - whose life, to her, probably feels to be in a perfect if selfish equilibrium - is oblivious to. With Fiona's intense but comfortable world about to cave in around her, her increasing stress is not helped by the latest case she is working on: one where Adam ( Fionn Whitehead from "Dunkirk"), a Jehovah's Witness boy and a minor, is refusing on religious grounds the blood transfusion he desperately needs to fight his lukaemia. Fiona's decisions in the months ahead go much further than a simple judgement on the case.

Two acting giants - one born in London; one born in New York - tower over this Ian McEwan adaptation like leviathons. I bandy around the phrase "national treasure" a lot in my reviews, but here Emma Thompson is simply breathtakingly powerful in the lead role of Judge Fiona Maye, exhibiting such extremes of emotion that you would like to think that an Oscar nomination would be assured. (However, before I run out and put a £10 bet on her to win, the film is such a small British film that unfortunately both a nomination and a win seem unlikely! THIS IS A CRIME! Please share and lobby people, lobby! Perhaps at the very least we can hope for some BAFTA recognition).

Sometimes a masterly lead performance can make a co-star performance seem unbalanced, but no such danger here. Stanley Tucci makes a perfect acting foil for Thompson: if he were a wine he would be described as "exasperation, frustration, compassion with strong notes of respect". And he carries it off with perfection.

This is an incredibly intelligent film, working on so many different levels and subject to so much interpretation. Fiona's feelings for the troubled teenager feel more maternal than sexual, but when those feelings become returned and escalate the whole piece develops a queasily oedipal quality. Many films have focused on illicit attractions between teacher and pupil, but here lies a new variation, with Maye fighting against her best professional insticts to 'do the right thing'. "I'm frightened of myself" she eventually wails to a colleague.

In his opening hospital scenes, (not withstanding the comic similarities between the guitar scene here and a certain scene in "Airplane"!), Adam seems completely other-wordly compared to a typical teen and this comes across as utterly false. That is, until you consider the oddness of his family background and Jehovah's Witness upbringing. As such, the film just about gets away with it. Whitehead does a good job with a difficult role.

If you've been in a court, you'll know that there is something regal and magical about a judge in full regalia entering a packed courtroom. So it's unusual to see the view from the other side of the door... a non-descript office corridor and a non-descript door. Helping the judge on this side of the door is her PA Nigel, played by the brilliant Jason Watkins: a TV regular (e.g. "Line of Duty", "W1A") but seen far less at the movies.

As a story of obsessive fixation, it borders on McEwan's disturbing earlier work "Enduring Love". And it has the potential to go in lots of interesting directions as a sort of bonkers platonic love triangle ("He wants to live with US?" splutters Tucci). Where the story does end up going was not particularly to my liking, and a melodramatic concert scene was - for me - a little overdone. However it does give rise to a scene (the 'sopping wet' scene) that shows Thompson at her most brilliant: if she DID get Oscar or BAFTA nominated then this will be her pre-announcement snippet.

It's a great film for showcasing acting talent, but beware: it's short on laughs, not remotely uplifting and takes a while to mentally recover from!

Kudos to all hands involved in making "The Children Act", a chamber drama about a family court Justice in London failing to achieve balance between her job and her private life. The legal issues involved are clearcut, but star Emma Thompson's acting brings out the profound emotional and pyschological issues underneath.

Stanley Tucci is perfect in understated support as her neglected husband, and a true discovery here is Fionn Whitehead as the teenage protagonist, a Jehovah's Witness whose life hangs in the balance as his parents, Church elders and he himself refuse the blood transfusions necessary to give his treatment for leukemia a chance to save his life. Fionn Whitehead, previously in a lead role in "Dunkirk", struck me as a powerhouse at the level of a young Tom Courtenay, and would be perfectly cast as either Billy Liar or the Long Distance Runner.

This is a very deep and thought provoking movie, relying on a supurb cast performance with Emma Thompson heading the list. Be careful reading the synopsis as it contains a few significant errors, might be based on the novel. I can't explain the errors without adding spoilers, and I don't do these.

The basic point of this movie is a confrontation between a woman striving to be as rational as possible, being a judge, and facing the limitations of pure rationalism when she has to rule on a question of faith. While faith also struggles to come out from this confrontation unscathed, as manifest by the young boy who has to live with the ruling of the judge. Very cleverly the story doesn't end with the judges ruling but with both sides of the debate having to live with the consequences of the ruling. The story is told with very English reserve that suits it very well. That's all one needs to know, before seeing it. If you get the chance do see it.