The Choral

 The National Treasure which is Alan Bennett is 91 years old and for me his later works have been somewhat uneven and all rather bleak in their storytelling. Perhaps it’s the near mortality of an old man that leeches into his writings, who knows, but this story of the formation of a Choral piece in the World War One backdrop of a Yorkshire mill town could have been his tour de force piece. The story is, of course more complicated than the rags-to-riches tale of a band of strangers. The teenage men, desperate for love and sex are awaiting conscription, as the older businessmen are dealing with loss of their sons and of fortunes. 

The women’s characters are strangely underwritten too, and even more unevenly played as either Madonnas or whores, which gives the whole film a cold and flatly unsentimental edge to it.

I was bored and disappointed by the whole thing .