52 Films by Women Vol 6. 35. THE NAN MOVIE (Directors: Josie Rourke, A N Other)
Unlikely to travel far outside of English-speaking countries
– a bit like Brexit, really – The Nan Movie is notable for the
absence of a director’s credit. That doesn’t mean it was rudderless; it started
production with Josie Rourke (Mary, Queen of Scots) at the helm.
During production, Rourke and co-writer-star Catherine Tate had a bit of
argy-bargy as they say in South London to the extent that Rourke is only listed
as executive producer and the co-writer of two songs. A credit reading ‘A
Catherine Tate Film’ confirms that creative differences were not overcome.
The Nan Movie is a spin-off from The
Catherine Tate Show (2004-9), that featured the titular actress in a
series of sketches featuring recurring characters like Lauren the Essex schoolgirl
who makes inappropriate suggestions (catchphrase: ‘am I bothered?’) and Joannie
Taylor, aka Nan, the foul-mouthed East London grandmother who makes
inappropriate comments. Tate’s
characters are keenly observed stereotypes who dominate every sketch. The
actress is best known outside the UK for playing Donna, companion to David
Tennant’s time-travelling Doctor Who between 2006 and 2009 in the
long-running British science-fantasy series. Nan was previously the subject of
a TV special in 2014 and a short-lived TV series in 2015. Without an extended
cast of characters around her to catalyse storylines, a single character cannot
sustain a television series. However, Nan is perfect movie spin-off material;
you can see why Tate, working with co-writer Brett Goldstein (Superbob)
opted for the latter, in particular choosing the road movie format.
Women directors have a solid track record in TV spin-offs. In
the US, Penelope Spheeris directed both Wayne’s World and The
Beverly Hillbillies while Betty Thomas helmed The Brady Bunch
Movie, I Spy and Alvin and the Chipmunks – The
Squeakquel. In the UK, Mandie Fletcher re-united with writer-star
Jennifer Saunders to direct Absolutely Fabulous – The Movie. Movie
spin-offs put established characters in unfamiliar settings and let them fly. Storylines
feature an emotional arc, though this is tempered by the fact that situation
comedy characters are fundamentally resistant to change.
The film offered Rourke the opportunity to shape Joannie’s
backstory. Here, her contribution is most evident. The flashbacks are less
crude than the framing road movie; Tate’s performance is toned down. Moreover,
they give the film an emotional core that doesn’t slip into sentimentality.
The rest of the film - clearly what fans had come to see -
is crude and obvious up to eleven. Nan is contrasted with her grandson, Jamie
(Mathew Horne), who is mindful where Nan is abrasive. In the film’s worst joke
(there is competition), he drives a van with the logo ‘Crafts Undo Negative
Thinking’, the acronym being a vulgarity. Nan is the sort of lady who would
shower praise in one breath and curse in another. When it comes to food, she is
dismissive of anything foreign-looking and she haggles for a Robert Mugabe
statue convinced it is the news reader Trevor McDonald. In short, Nan is
exactly the sort of little Englander who would vote for Britain to leave the
European Union. Indeed, she enjoys Jägerbombs
with a complete lack of irony.
Nan learns that her sister, Nell (Katherine Parkinson) is
dying, but is in no mood to see her; the pair haven’t spoken for decades.
Jamie, who finds Nell’s letter, is keen to heal the rift. Instead of driving to
Coventry where she hopes to redeem her ‘Wowcher’ for a ‘Hollywood’ (spa
treatment), he takes her first to Liverpool, then to Dublin, Nell residing on
an ‘island off the coast of Ireland’.
Tate exercises her talent for improvisation, messing with
the craft products in Jamie’s van. In the most inspired gag, she puts pipe
cleaners in her mouth and exclaims that she was swallowed a multi-coloured
tarantula. (I laughed.) She gets mileage
(sorry) out of the nutritionally vague meat snacks that she takes along for the
ride and for urinating into Tupperware. As the van jolts, she apologies, ‘sorry
– should have put the lid on’. In the least inspired improvisation, she mangles
the name ‘Sandi Toksvig’ (co-host of The Great British Bake Off).
‘Do you still do those little animations?’ Nan asks Jamie.
‘Yeah, I’ve got thirty followers now,’ he responds proudly. This is by way of
justifying the crude animated interludes that use photographs of Jamie, Nan and
the van, superimposing googly eyes. These interludes act as a bridge and allow the
filmmakers to stage sequences cheaply – including a car chase.
In Liverpool, Nan meets her nemesis, Mahler (Niky Wardley),
formerly a social worker who was sacked following to Nan’s outright lies
regarding the theft of Sky satellite television transmissions. Mahler is now
working for the police and complains that Jamie’s van is parked outside a
hostel across three disabled bays. ‘I have three disabled badges,’ counters Nan,
waving them like a fan. As Nan plays with the breast pocket zips from officer
Mahler’s jacket, Mahler responds with a deadpan sour face. Officer Mahler
pursues Nan throughout the rest of the film, though the payoff is
underwhelming.
Set pieces include Nan heading downstairs ostensibly to
reprimand a group of loud Australians, only to join them in drinking games,
then heading off clubbing, where she inadvertently takes a popper, having
dropped her own pill on the dancefloor. Once in Dublin, Nan stops off for a
drink and offers a lift to Mick (Tom Vaughn-Lawlor), a self-confessed troubled
man. He turns out to be a vegan activist, who handcuffs himself to Nan and
takes her with him to blow up a chicken farm, having set the birds free first.
The ‘MMM’ tattooed near his wrist stands for ‘Meat Means Murder’ and not, as
Nan remarks, ‘Mick, Mick, Mick’. In uttering the latter, Tate channels the
London comedian Jim Davidson (‘nick, nick, nick’), whose right-wing political
convictions aren’t ones many would admit to sharing. In the finale, Nan arrives
at the ‘island off of Ireland’ and gets a surprise.
At its best, the film tackles racism through Walter (Parker
Sawyers, best known for playing Barack Obama in the romantic drama, Southside
With You), a black American GI who falls for Joannie but is seduced by
Nell. At a dance, white British soldiers are told by the women, ‘we don’t want
your kind here,’ an appropriation of their response to Walter. The relationship
between Walter and Joannie is credible, the latter charmed by Joannie’s humour.
Their relationship is charted through a series of cinema trips during which
Nell asserts herself, edging Joannie out. Meanwhile Joannie is courted by the
steadfast but seemingly uncharismatic Terry (Jack Doolan), who is there for
Joannie when she needs him. Their blossoming relationship – and its decline –
is told through dialogue-free vignettes involving ice cream cones; towards the
end, Joannie hides one behind her back to surprise Terry in hospital. The
sequence is reminiscent of Carl Fredrickson’s romance montage at the beginning
of the animated film, Up, and achieves a similar impact.
Tate has always based her comedy around socially divisive
issues, for example the treatment of homosexuality, seemingly endorsing the
so-called norm but undercutting it. Here, she tackles not only vegan activism
but also gender dysphoria. The climactic punchline might seem a joke too far,
Nan endorsing heterogeneity in spite of the alternative being presented as
unthreatening. Some of the reviews of The Nan Movie do not get
Tate’s comedy, that she is taking a position to an absurd level to show how
ridiculous it is. In the case of vegan activism, Tate mocks the militancy of
the most extreme form of protest. The film was shot in 2019, before extreme
climate activism (Extinction Rebellion) took off, otherwise Tate might have
changed her target. Nan’s opinions aren’t a version of Tate’s; they shouldn’t
be taken as the film’s message.
Some of the film is extremely subtle. In a throwaway line,
Jamie remarks that he hoped that the bee on the top of his van would be
‘iconic’; British bees are the very species threatened by Britain after it exited
the European Union and subsequently planned to abandon environmental
protections. At the climax, when Nan hugs another character, her fingers hover
above and twitch before she completes a clasping movement; Tate is strong on
performance details.
The running ‘roll call’ gag – characters bursting into
rhyming song (‘My name is Nan/From London Town’) – yields a chuckle. The film
embraces stereotypes only to tackle them. Whether the audience get the whole
joke is moot. Certainly, The Nan Movie, which ends with Joannie accepting
her neighbours – she believes they are ‘naturalists’ because they get fresh
vegetables delivered in a crate - generates a good many laughs. The film may
not travel far, but it knows its audience.
Reviewed at Cineworld Dover, Kent, South-East England,
Friday 18 March 2022, 20:30 screening
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