Dean Spanley
U, Nationwide
Dean Spanley is a family film and a sweet film and a kindly film with the most delicious cast (Peter O’Toole, Jeremy Northam, Sam Neill, Judy Parfitt) but it is also a slow film — the first hour is almost unbearably uneventful — which could do with a bit of a rocket up its backside, not that I am volunteering to do it. Hell’s bells, it’s nearly Christmas! I don’t have time for rockets and backsides! As it is, I’m waking nightly at 4 a.m. thinking, ‘Brandy butter; what’s all that about, then?’ Rockets and backsides! You do it, if it means so much to you, but do leave alone the final half an hour, which is engrossing and delightful and stars a smashing Welsh spaniel with fabulous, flappy ears. Yes, I’m a dog person and would actually like to point out at this juncture that a dog is not just for Christmas, particularly if it goes on to higher education and wants to be a doctor.
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