[wpdevart_youtube]p16_Zap5DCo[/wpdevart_youtube]
That Good Night
****
Dir: Eric Styles (12A, 92 mins)
Starring: John Hurt, Sofia Helin, Max Brown
(UK, 12A, 1hr 32mins)
John Hurt’s final film often has an unbearable poignancy as he plays a man coming to terms with his own impending death, whilst he himself was battling terminal cancer during its filming.
Adapted from the stage play by NJ Crisp with the central role originated by Sir Donald Sinden, Hurt plays Ralph, an irascible writer living in a beautifully-shot Portugal with his wife played by Sofia Helin, from TV’s The Bridge, with no leather trousers in sight. He has an estranged son, Michael, played by Max Brown, who he has never really connected with, but who nevertheless he calls out of the blue in an attempt at reconciliation before it gets too late.
His son and prospective bride to be Cassie (Welsh actress and Gotham star Erin Richards) arrive and past family scars are re-opened, with insults and recriminations exchanged before eventually Hurt comes to realize that his grumpy ways need to be mended.
Charles Dance cameos as an apparent euthanasia facilitator who may be more than he seems in a well-handled low-key drama, which, whilst not quite escaping its stage roots, still moves and engrosses at a languid pace. Hurt is fantastic as the writer who is struggling with his own mortality and his legacy. and it will be a very hard heart indeed who does not shed a tear at the film’s poetic end. Welsh director Eric Styles has created well-crafted dramas like this before with Dreaming of Joseph Lees and Relative Values and captures Hurt’s swansong with aplomb. A worthy send-off for an excellent actor, who seems to know this will be his last film.
words Keiron Self
Out in cinemas from May 11