Film / News
Golden Years premiere and trailer revealed
Golden Years, the pensioner heist comedy that was shot in and around Bristol last March, will receive its London premiere on April 14 before opening nationwide on April 29. The film stars a cast of British veterans led by Virginia McKenna, of Born Free fame, who returns to the big screen for the first time since Sliding Doors in 1998. She’s joined by the likes of Bernard Hill, Alun Armstrong, Sue Johnston, Una Stubbs, Simon Callow and Phil Davis. A trailer for the film has just been released. Check it out below.
John Miller’s charming, enjoyable film takes a few well-aimed swipes at the low-hanging fruit of greedy bankers, unscrupulous care homes and NHS postcode lotteries as it does the Robin Hood thing in a world of Henleaze retirement bungalows, bowls and bingo clubs, and visits to scenic National Trust properties (Tyntesfield ahoy!). With its excellent cast of veteran thesping talent and a strong vein of the mildly risque randy old biddy humour that’s now mandatory in senior comedies, it needs only a big marketing push to connect with the lucrative Best Exotic Marigold Hotel audience. Hill and McKenna play an aggrieved elderly couple who take to robbing banks while wearing rubber masks and brandishing cucumbers wrapped inside plastic bags. Una Stubbs, Phil Davis and Simon Callow (doing an accent of the deepest Somerset) are among their chums. It all looks terrific, with lots of aerial and time-lapse shots of the city. If it’s necessary to overlook a few plot holes on the way to the feelgood ending, at least there’s a ‘dogging on the Downs’ gag and we get to see Mr. Callow’s arse.
The premiere takes place at the Odeon Tottenham Court Road to mark the 50th anniversary of the Royal Premiere of McKenna’s most famous movie, Born Free. It’s a charity event in support of her Born Free Foundation – the organisation that fights a David vs Goliath battle against the relentless cutesy propaganda onslaught of the zoo industry, challenging its conservation claims and campaigning to keep wildlife in the wild.
We’re not permitted to upload our interview with director John Miller just yet because of a pesky embargo, but you can check out our set report here and read about our Features Editor’s experiences as an extra here. And yes, she did make the final cut.
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