Shown: 5 October 2022
Exminster Film Club Rating: 90%
- Date of release: 2022
- Running time: 1h 35m
- Director: Roger Michell
- Writers: Richard Bean and Clive Coleman
- Country: UK
- Language: English
- Links: IMDB Rotten Tomatoes Metacritic BBFC Official Film Website
The Duke Plot Synopsis
In 1961, 60-year-old Kempton Bunton stole Goya’s portrait of the Duke of Wellington from the National Gallery in London. He sent ransom notes saying that he would return the painting on condition that the government invested more in care for the elderly. What happened next became the stuff of legend. An uplifting true story about a good man who set out to change the world and managed to save his marriage.
Film Reviews
You could dine on nothing but lard for twenty years and still not develop the hardness of heart necessary to avoid being won over by Roger Michell‘s The Duke, a ridiculously charming British comedy that dunks a gamely accented prestige cast into an appealingly milky true story like so many digestives into a warm, well-earned, early evening cuppa.
Jessica Kiang, The Playlist
The Duke is that rarest of things: a comedy that knows that a twinkle in the eye and a fire in the belly needn’t be mutually exclusive.
Robbie Collin – The Telegraph
Official Film Trailer for The Duke
Review from an EFC Member
A film based on a true story. Outstanding performances by Jim Boadbent as a man with an active social conscience and Helen Mirren as his long suffering wife. The story is touching, a balance of grief, justice and many humorous moments.
I greatly enjoyed the whole film and would happily watch it again.
Judith