First Take: Victoria and Abdul- a really nice British story, adapted with excellence

SYPNOSIS: Queen Victoria strikes up an unlikely friendship
with a young Indian clerk named Abdul Karim.

And so we have the new film from the director who brought us
The Queen, Philomena and last year’s Florence Foster Jenkins. Once again,
Stephen Frears has adapted a story that isn’t well known in the public eye- but
he really has done it justice.

Frears directs the film very well indeed, and working to a
script from Lee Hall, the film is as tight as its dialogue, with a sharp sense
of pacing building up to a proper emotional release when the credits roll,
telling a story that isn’t the same archetypical ones that other films about
Queen Victoria have done to death. The cinematography from Danny Cohen also has
that same sense of flair, and combined with music from Thomas Newman, the
technical talent behind the film is enough to make it work effectively.

And then we have the performances. As ever, Dame Judi Dench
is fantastic in the role of Queen Victoria, and with a supporting cast
including Eddie Izzard (who absolutely nails a more serious role than he
usually does), Michael Gambon, Simon Callow and the late great Tim
Pigott-Smith, this is a film stacked with great talent- but the show stealer is
Ali Fazal as Abdul. When he’s paired with Dench, he makes the story believable,
and that’s an important aspect for a film like this, especially as it clocks in at a nice 1 hour 52 minutes.

THE VERDICT

This is an outstanding piece of British cinema, and it’s
going to do ridiculously well in cinemas up and down the land. Great
performances, great script, great director… what’s not to like?

RATING: 5/5