Directed by:
Roger MichellCinematography:
Mike EleyComposer:
George FentonCast:
Jim Broadbent, Helen Mirren, Fionn Whitehead, Anna Maxwell Martin, Matthew Goode, Jack Bandeira, Aimée Kelly, Charlotte Spencer, Sian Clifford (more)Plots(1)
The Duke is the true story of Kempton Bunton, a 60-year old taxi driver, who stole Goya’s portrait of the Duke of Wellington from the National Gallery in London. It was the first (and remains the only) theft in the Gallery’s history. Kempton sent ransom notes saying that he would return the painting on condition that the government invested more in care for the elderly - he had long campaigned for pensioners to receive free television. What happened next became the stuff of legend. Only 50 years later did the full story emerge - Kempton had spun a web of lies. The only truth was that he was a good man, determined to change the world and save his marriage - how and why he used the Duke to achieve that is a wonderfully uplifting tale. (Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment)
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It's one of those cute British pictures, like a porcelain dog with a pipe, sitting in a rocking chair. Lovely for the mantlepiece, makes for a good mood and a feeling of home for a while, but forgettable. They made the main character and his family too slick for my taste. A bunch of cute little creatures, local goofballs, friendly fools who are like children. Their purity sheds light on our distorted and hard world. It's clichéd, it's trite, and I don't think the protagonist's image of himself as a local hero would agree with such a portrayal. Or at least, I hope so. I hope he get a restraining order forbidding them to portray him as an impractical knucklehead who might be right about something, but otherwise we have every right to look down on him. IN A NUTSHELL: How to fight the system when no one even notices you're fighting.
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