Review of The Lady in the Van (2015) by Dawdlingpoet — 25 Nov 2021

This is a slow moving (plot wise) comedy drama film, with themes including social etiquette, faux pas and acceptance. The characters are quite quirky, with Margaret being very stand-off-ish, quite snappy yet surprisingly quick witted as well. The dialogue is quite clever and I enjoyed watching and, more to the point, listening to the conversations between Alan Bennett, Margaret and others. Frankly, to me it seemed like a bit of a mad cap story, one which is unlikely to have happened in real life, although I acknowledge that, at the start of the film, its stated that its (if but 'very loosely') based on a true story. I thought it was quite touching, the friendship that Alan and Margaret slowly make. There is a lot of intellectual or otherwise high brow conversation featured and I'd say that if your not keen on films which focus mainly on character development and which are, thus, dialogue heavy then this won't be for you. There is a fair amount of comedy present but its not of a physical, slapstick style for the most part - its more a case of clash of the sharp tongues.

Cast wise, Maggie Smith plays Margaret (aka Miss Shepherd), someone who is stubborn, strong willed and vocally rather sharp. She's a bit of a firecracker, you could say. Alan Bennett is played by Alex Jennings, who I felt gave a decent performance as a bit of an introvert, a kind but quiet and ever so slightly awkward yet pleasantly polite and slightly bumbling man next door type I suppose. I particularly enjoyed the conversations between these two characters. Other cast members include Jim Broadbent as Underwood and Deborah Findlay as Pauline.

As far as the use of music is concerned, there are some quite jaunty, fairly jovial sounding orchestral pieces played during certain scenes, although I don't remember any specific tracks I could list as such. I found the film to be amusing and quite clever, fairly entertaining in general although perhaps a little slow plot pace wise but otherwise I have no real complaints about this film at all.

Content wise, there's little likely to offend. It contains a few profanities, one instance of violence and a sex reference but nothing very graphic or explicit, hence the 12 rating its been given. I was almost surprised it wasn't given a PG rating but I suppose thats due to the few 'f'-words present (enough said).

I'd recommend this film, as I felt it was quite a pleasant watch. It is quite amusing in parts, with some witty dialogue and the characters are well portrayed by the cast but it is perhaps a little slow, plot pace wise, maybe. Its quite good, rather quirky and as thus worth a watch, in my view.