Fackham Hall
2025
Fackham Hall was my aperitif before Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair, and it is perfectly suited for that purpose. While not perhaps a main attraction on its own, the film amused me while I awaited my other showtime. This is the kind of film I can see because of my Regal Unlimited plan. There is no financial risk to trying a so-so movie. But, really, Fackham Hall (I confess to enjoying the title’s vulgar punnery) is more than just so-so, if still somewhere below “good.”
After enjoying this year’s Naked Gun remake, I was a bit more emboldened to take in another stupid comedy. This one is a parody of Edwardian manor house romances like Downton Abbey. Thomasin McKenzie is the “tired and barren husk of a woman” (read: 23 and unmarried) whose unexpected love-match forms the spine of the story. Her parents are played by Damian Lewis and Katherine Waterston, and the repugnant heir she is trying to get out of marrying is a perfectly cast Tom Felton. Hayley Mills provides the requisite voiceover narration. But, of course, all the other necessary types are present: the penniless orphan she loves, the sardonic matriarch, the imperious butler and icy housekeeper, the tragic sister spoiled by ill-placed love, the mustachioed detective, the servants who are little more than (and sometimes simply are) furniture, the brash American woman, etc.
The movie has a lot of fun at the expense of the era’s non-feminist views. Two women rhapsodize about meeting a man so that their life has meaning and are immediately introduced as the Bechdel Sisters. When our heroine, Rose, is late for a family function, she is scolded by her mother: “Where have you been? Not reading or thinking, I hope. You know that’s man’s work.” I do think they could have gotten more than two easy jokes out of the American girl’s steamrolling vulgarity, though.
The main targets, of course, are the narrative tropes of the genre itself: foundlings, child labor, hunky stableboys, cross-class affairs, bicycle accidents, etc. Much of the comedy is drawn from timeless stupid comedy staples such as the “who’s on first” confusion about Detective Watt’s name.
This is a film aimed at chuckles, although there are a couple big laughs. Rather than list all the best jokes here, I admonish those interested to enjoy it upon its inevitable streaming release. It will surely be soon.