The Duke (2022) * * *

 

Directed by:  Roger Michell

Starring:  Jim Broadbent, Helen Mirren, Matthew Goode, Fionn Whitehead, Aimee Kelly

Kempton Bunton (Broadbent) is a sixtyish working class man forever standing up for his neighbors in middle class Newcastle circa 1961.   He is fired from his job as a taxi driver because he decides unilaterally that certain fares don't have to pay and talks the ears off the rest.   He and his sometimes exasperated wife Dorothy (Mirren) are still grieving the loss of their teenage daughter from years earlier.  She doesn't want to ever talk about the loss.  Kempton, an amateur playwright, wants to publish a play about it.  Dorothy prefers to keep her head down, do her job as a maid to a local wealthy family, and keep out of trouble.   

Kempton invites trouble in the form of BBC tax agents who come to collect the BBC tax which is due from anyone whose television receives BBC programming.   Kempton disagrees with the tax, especially since his television doesn't get the BBC (thanks to some shrewd jerry-rigging of the wires), and feels others of his age and limited means shouldn't have to pay extra every month for a television set.

The Duke of the title is a painting of the Duke of Wellington which disappears from The National Gallery.  It is stolen with relative ease despite being heavily publicized.   It winds up in Kenton's son's bedroom where he and Jackie (Whitehead) hide it behind a dresser.   How the painting is discovered behind the piece of bulky furniture is a funny sequence.   Kempton and his family are not adept at the criminal life, but we like them for being decent people.   The Duke is directed by Roger Michell (his final film before his death) with energy and warmth.   At a little over ninety minutes, The Duke moves briskly and is, believe it or not, based on a true story.  

In the grand scheme of things, The Duke is not a story of great consequence or depth.  There is a plot twist you don't expect which may or may not have happened, but it's fun anyway.  It is a strange little story with mostly lovable characters in which the truth is ultimately stranger than fiction.