Roald Dahl tale missing the magic touch of the author
To Olivia (M, 94 mins) Directed by John Hay Reviewed by James Croot ★★★
‘You’re one big kid – and the day you stop is the day I file for divorce.’’ US actor Patricia Neal’s (Keeley Hawes) warmth towards her husband, author Roald Dahl (Hugh Bonneville), was very much put to the test in the early-1960s.
Both were already struggling professionally – parts drying up for her, sales non-existent for him – when private tragedy hit their Buckinghamshire home. Struck down by measles, their eldest daughter Olivia (Darcey Ewart) develops life-threatening encephalitis.
For a family that had already nearly lost their son Theo in a New York traffic accident, they are all left heartbroken when she fails to recover.
However, it’s Roald’s response that really drives a wedge between them all. After packing up all of Olivia’s things while the wake is still in progress, he won’t even allow any of the others to say her name.
‘‘Why can’t you just cry like a normal person?’’ Patricia vents, ‘‘It’s not just you who lost her.’’
Pretty soon she’s hugging the postman for simply offering a more sympathetic ear and contemplating taking a ‘‘20-page job’’ in Los Angeles (a little Paul Newmanstarring film called Hud) just for a change of scene.
Despite two solid performances from the reliable Bonneville (Downton Abbey) and Hawes (Bodyguard), To Olivia never really tugs at the heartstrings in quite the way one feels it should. Sombre and sober, it seems unsure whether to focus on being a portrait of a marriage in crisis (there are just a handful of terse words and tense conversations between them), a whimsical fantasy (the seeds for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory are rather stomped in, rather than sown), or a tale of how both threw themselves into their work, turning personal pain into public triumph.
And while John Hay (who also directs) and David Logan’s script is apparently based on Stephen Michael Shearer’s 2006 biography Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life, for the most part, her turmoil plays second-fiddle to Dahl’s, which even, slightly oddly, manifests itself as his inner-schoolboy.
A memorable cameo from the late Geoffrey Palmer – his final performance – is a poignant delight, and Debbie Wiseman’s (Wolf Hall) haunting score sets the right tone, even if it reminded me, a lot, of the quieter moments of James Horner’s Oscar-nominated Braveheart soundscape.
To Olivia is now screening in select cinemas nationwide.