Fackham Hall

Directed by Jim O’Hanlon, Fackham Hall details the chaos that ensues after an upper-crust family’s youngest daughter (Thomasin McKenzie’s Rose) eventually falls for a thief and orphan named Eric (Ben Radcliffe). Filmmaker O’Hanlan, armed with Steve Dawson, Andrew Dawson, Tim Inman, Jimmy Carr, and Patrick Carr’s screenplay, delivers a briskly-paced parody that gets off to a relatively promising start, as the movie benefits from its irreverent approach to a familiar genre and several agreeably less-than-subtle performances – with, in terms of the latter, Damian Lewis’ funny, goofy turn as said family’s deranged patriarch standing as an obvious highlight within the proceedings. It’s disappointing to note, then, that Fackham Hall slowly-but-surely (and palpably) begins to run out of steam as it enters its ineffective, padded-out midsection and second half, with the growing absence of laughs certainly exacerbating the picture’s sluggish vibe, and there’s little doubt, as well, the movie’s seriously tedious final stretch ensures that it peters out to a fairly distressing degree – with the end result a misfire that might’ve worked within the context of a comedic anthology film.

*1/2 out of ****