Parky At the Pictures (21/8/2026)

(Reviews of & Sons; Sunny Dancer; and Holy Days)

& SONS.

Pablo Trapero was one of the leading lights of New Argentine Cinema, thanks to such fine features as El Bonaerense (2002), Familia Rodante (2004), Lion's Den (2008), and Carancho (2010). Despite winning the Best Director prize at Venice for The Clan (2015), less fuss was made in the UK of either White Elephant (2012) or La Quietud (2018). But Trapero returns to make his English-language debut with & Sons, which has been co-adapted by Canadian writer-director Sarah Polley from a 2013 novel by American author, David Gilbert.

Andrew Dyer (Bill Nighy) was once a prominent novelist. Now, with his white hair and beard unkempt, he spends his time lying on his study sofa listening to jazz records. Teenage son Andy (Noah Dupe) persuades him to give the eulogy for an old pal from the days when he still had friends. But Andrew flees the church when he realises his son has ducked outside because he's too embarrassed to watch his vodka-fuelled mublings.

At school, Andy is surprised when a trainee librarian reveals that she regularly emails his father, who claims he never uses computers. Hoping to connect through messages, Andy pours out his heart about being in his father's shadow, only to receive a reply that the email account is run by Jeanie Spokes (Shalom Brune-Franklin), an assistant to his father's agent, who usually answers fan mail.

Convinced by a dream that he is dying, Andrew confides in Czech housekeeper Gerde (Anna Geislerová) that he wants to see his other boys. Richard (Johnny Flynn) is a screenwriter in New York and has cut a deal with a Hollywood producer named Rainer (Dominic West) to adapt one of his father's novels. He flies back for the reunion with adult son, Emmett (Arthur Conti), while artist brother Jamie (George MacKay) is showing his latest creations to his mother, Isabell Platt (Imelda Staunton), who has nothing to do with her ex-husband since he betrayed her and Andy was born.

Arriving together, the sons enter hesitantly at Gerde's bidding. Andy coaxes them into a tentative hug before Andrew comes into the kitchen to meet his grandson and be delighted by the Scotch to air ratio when he pours him a drink. As a reformed alcoholic, Richard is dismayed by the spectacle, but Andrew insists he's old enough to be drunk whenever he likes.

Taking Richard and Jamie into his study, Andrew reveals that the story of his adultery is wrong. Instead, he was contacted around 20 years ago by the representatives of the group that Alfred Nobel had formed eight decades earlier to create an heir. The paleogeneticist persuaded Andrew to raise a genetically engineered boy as his own son, even though he was actually `an autonmous reflection'. Jamie and Richard refuse to believe that Andy is a clone and demand their father takes responsibility for his foolishness. However, he shows them official documentation of the surrogate birth in the Czech Republic and asks them to look out for Andy after he dies.

Jamie thinks the whole idea is preposterous, but Richard can see a resemblance and he thinks they should tell their mother what Andrew has said. She is incredulous, but is troubled by the clips Richard unearths online and, after a night with little sleep, she goes to confront her ex. Andy opens the door to her and they have an awkward exchange before Andrew comes to escort Isabel into his study. She asks why he didn't trust her with the news and used a lie to cover things up. He claims he had hoped they would get over the supposed indiscretion and admits that he had accepted the offer because he had been such a lousy father first time that he had hoped to make the most of a second chance. Hurt that he could have been so cruel and selfish, Isabel leaves and Andrew curses himself for being so frank.

As he smashes the room up and knocks portraits off the wall in his anguish, a tearful Isabel drives home and informs her sons that their father had been telling the truth. She also admits that her body had reacted to Andy as though she was with the man she had fallen in love with decades earlier. Richard and Jamie are aghast, with the former ranting that she can't believe the man who had ruined his life by always making him feel so stupid. But she insists that Andrew had always encouraged him and her point is reinforced when Rainer calls to discuss the screenplay and Richard absents himself.

He agrees to go to a book launch with Rainer and persuades Jamie to tag along, unaware that Andy has accepted an invitation to the same event from Jeannie and has asked Emmett to come, too. Having calmed down and started to write, Andrew suddenly becomes aware that Andy isn't home and he begins to panic in case he finds out the truth by accident.

Meanwhile, Jamie hears for the first time that Richard has promised Rainer the rights to an A.N. Dyer classic and he stops his brother falling off the wagon at the book launch by taking him to one side for a heart to heart. However, a drunken Andy spots them and puts his arms around their shoulders and introduces them to Jeanie. She resists his efforts to get her to dance, but she soon has more to worry about, as a roaring Andrew arrives and walks right into Rainer, who gushes about the privilege of adapting Saturn's Salute. Appalled by the news, Andrew shrugs off Richard and Jamie to find Andy, who is far from pleased to see him. He tells him that he's going to leave home and apply to colleges in New York because he wants to be nothing like him and nowhere near him.

Richard and Jamie take Andrew home, with Gerde driving. The latter films him dozing off on the sofa, while the former wanders into his study to find his unpublished manuscripts. In the meantime, Andy has gone in search of Emmett, who is staying with his grandmother and has revealed that both he and Jeanie are queer. Isabel is kind to Andy, who is sobering up and feels regretful, even though he doesn't believe he can forgive Andrew for his unconventional childhood. He is puzzled by the fact he is so drawn to her.

Back in the study, Andrew asks Richard if he believes that Andy is a clone. He nods, but finds himself on the back foot when Andrew berates him for colluding with a producer behind his back. Taunting him that his addiction was the only original thing he has ever done, Andrew refuses to accept Richard's accusation that he plagiarised his teenage journals for his bestselling book. Livid that he can't apologise for anything, Richard tells Andrew that he wasn't just a lousy father, he actually destroyed his kids. This is the problem bothering Andy, as he doesn't want to be like his father and Isabel reassures him that he is his own man now and can avoid making the choices to be insular and bitter that ruined Andrew's life.

After Richard and Andrew calm down and share a goodbye hug, Gerde drives them to the station. Mulling things over in his mind, Andy settles down in Isabel's spare room. Left alone, Andrew tosses all the documents pertaining to the cloning process on to the fire, along with his typed manuscripts, one of which he retrieves to lob into the garden before he pulls down the window and closes the shutters.

A voiceover has Andrew reading from the last thing he wrote. He laments that his sons were never close, as we see Richard back in the US and Jamie still searching for métier. We also see Gerde drop Andy off at college and ask if he's not going to give his mum a kiss. She poses for graduation photos, as the montage continues under Andrew's melancholic reflection. Isabel reads aloud from the scorched manuscript on the towpath, as she walks with Gerde beside the Thames. She tears a piece off the cover and hands it back before walking away.

How much is promised by the cast list and the collaboration between a first-rate director and a co-scenarist who had previously demonstrated such keen insight into domestic strife in Away From Her (2006) and toxic masculinity in Women Talking (2022). But this drama disappoints at every turn, with the script too often being tin-eared and the performances exuding excessive masterclass intensity. `Authenticity,' Andrew bellows at one point. Well, there's little on show here and that's a great shame, as the actors commit wholly and might well have earned themselves a standing ovation in a theatre.

In essence, this is a sci-fi spin on King Lear, in which a cloned Cordelia turns on the fond and foolish father, while Goneril tries to empathise and Regan wallows in self-pity. Curiously, the cloning twist isn't the story's suspect spot and it still might have worked with, maybe, Anthony Hopkins as Andrew. But, while Bill Nighy looks the part of the dishevelled, drunken recluse, he struggles to convey the fury Andrew feels at himself, as well as his sons and his situation. Nighy is more convincing in the earnest encounter with Imelda Staunton, but she never quite gets into her stride, either, in spite of the inspired reading of the scene in which Isabel relates her physical feelings on first meeting Andy.

Noah Jupe starts well, but becomes less persuasive as Andy starts to rebel, while George MacKay is let down by the sketchiness of his character and the fact that Jamie is too hidebound by his resentment towards his father to take any new information onboard. Away from a hammy Dominic West (which is as much Trapero's fault as his own), Seemingly replacing Matt Smith, Johnny Flynn settles nicely into his role, with a video call home suggesting that while Richard might have succumbed to alcoholism, he has still managed to be a decent dad. Flynn also acquits himself well in the study showdown with Nighy, although the decision to cross-cut between this and Isabel's homelier chat with Andy takes much of the heat out of the confrontation, so that the final embrace feels like it's been tagged on without us seeing how the pair stepped back from their aggressive rutting.

Editing with Gemma Cabello and Thom Smalley, Trapero includes several montages that pass adroit comment on the characters and their connections. But the film's pacing not only contributes to the feeling that it's overlong, but it also draws attention to the actorliness of the cast and leaves one to wonder why Trapero and Polley relocated the novel from New York to an English countryside that neither is entirely familiar with.

Production designer Sonja Klaus makes a splendid job creating the clutter in Andrew's study, while Worcester College, Oxford does sterling service in several scenes. But, while it looks good (kudos to cinematographer Diego Dussuel), this proves so superficial, laborious, and uncompelling on so many other levels that it falls far short of the emotional depth it seeks and desperately needs.

SUNNY DANCER.

In 2022, George Jaques made history by becoming the first person to be cited in the acting, writing, directing, and producing categories of Screen International's annual Star of Tomorrow selection. Having staged plays as a teenager, he had announced himself with the shorts, Silence, Can I Tell You Something? (both 2020), Cracked, Tuesday, and Tiny Dancer (all 2021). Made for just £500,000, his debut feature, Black Dog (2023), was also highly impressive. But the 26 year-old has taken a step backwards with Sunny Dancer, even though this bracing teenpic could not be better intentioned in its efforts to reflect the attitudes that Jaques has witnessed while working with the Teenage Cancer Trust.

Seventeen year-old Ivy Pritchard (Bella Ramsey) is 10 months into remission from leukaemia. Since her diagnosis, she has struggled to maintain her school friendships, as she doesn't think anyone understands what she is going through, as she fights to beat the disease. Hoping some time away with other survivors will give Ivy a fresh perspective, parents Karen (Jessica Gunning) and Bob (James Norton) book her in for a four-week stay at a Children Run Free camp in Scotland and she reluctantly agrees to go.

Having been embarrassed by her mother on being dropped off, Ivy is dismayed by the cornball speech made by camp director, Patrick (Neil Patrick Harris). She finds his inspirational slogans patronising and cringes at the welcome song he sings with returning campers like Jake (Daniel Quinn-Toye), Ralph (Earl Cave), Archie (Conrad Khan), and Maisie (Jasmine Elcock). Billeted in a cabin with Ella (Ruby Stokes), Ivy is appalled by her stalkerish crush on activities counsellor, Tristan (Louis Gaunt), and her determination to lose her virginity.

Resisting Ella's urging to join the popular table for breakfast, Ivy gets into trouble for calling a guest speaker a `grief tourist' for cashing in on her own recovery from cancer. She accuses Patrick of having a `paedo wall' of photographs, but apologises because she had promised her folks to give the camp a fair try. Agreeing to meet with therapist Lucy (Shalom Brune-Franklin), Ivy makes it clear she is sceptical about talking through her situation, but she takes the medication provided by Brenda (Josie Walker), even though she doubts the chatty Ella's contention that the nurse can sniff out cancer.

With his gentle Scottish accent and wry sense of humour, Jake tries to befriend Ivy on a ramble and Ella teases her. However, she sits at the gang's table for the next meal and joins them in ribbing Brenda because she's such a grouch. She also ducks out of a screening with them to hang out in the woods, where they discuss their conditions and how people treat them. Ralph persuades them all to go swimming in the lake and Ivy and Jake hide in the reeds when they are spotted. They flirt with each other, as they ask getting to know questions, and laugh when the others tell them to kiss from the bank.

As Week Two begins, Ivy is very much part of things. She talks to Ella about her diagnosis, hair loss, and fears that she might never walk again and gets a better understanding of why she is so keen to lose her virginity. Having kissed Jake, Ivy joins the group at a nearby fairground, where they have their faces painted and go on the rides. As they leave, however, they are cornered by some locals kids and wind up in Patrick's office after a punch up. Ivy goes in all guns blazing in asking him if he gets a kick out of lording it over sick kids. But Patrick reveals that he lost a son at 12 after a three-year battle and he explains that all the photos on his wall are of those who didn't pull through. He reminds Ivy that she is one of the lucky ones and that, when she was sick, she would have given anything to have been a survivor at CRF Camp.

Chastened, Ivy skulks on her bed. But the others (minus Jake) come over with a bottle and they chill in the cabin. The boys gets a lesson in the realities of feminine hygiene products before they dance the night away. Woken by a phone call from Jake, Ivy rushes into the woods to find him having a panic attack and she holds him to calm him down. Ella had told her this might happen and she realises that everyone deals with illness and recovery in their own way.

Tasked with paddling a canoe to Survival Island and spending the night under canvas, the friends are so down after campfire cooking that Ivy teaches them the cheer-up dance her parents invented to the Scissor Sisters hit "I Don't Feel Like Dancin'". Alone in the tent, Ivy and Jake confess feelings for each other and have sex using the condoms Karen had slipped into her daughter's bag. They also think Ella and Archie are getting it on, but they are merely wrestling, although he has a crush on her and she is pleased he punched the kid who had insulted her at the fair.

Next morning, Ralph reveals that he's had some bad test results and is leaving the following day. Ivy persuades Patrick to turn a blind eye so he can leave the camp disco and have a drunken night with Jake. Brenda slips him a chaser in his soft drink before he leaves and she promises him everything will be okay. Jake finds Ivy after carrying his pal home and tells her that he loves her before throwing up. Following Ralph's emotional departure, Ivy tells Lucy she feels guilty for surviving and doing nothing with her life when a bright boy on her ward died after getting into university. Lucy assures her that she has not stolen his space and that the pain will ease, even though it will never completely go away.

Ella celebrates her 18th during Week Four and Archie buys her a replacement lens cap for the camcorder she is always using. However, she is more excited because Tristan has promised to take her out for the evening, only for him to reveal that she reminds him of the younger sister whose death prompted him to become a volunteer. Ella is aghast, but takes being teased by Ivy, who is video calling Jake (who isn't feeling well), who confides that Archie is besotted with her. They kiss after he teaches her a quick release knot and Ella is choosing her outfit for a date when Patrick comes to the cabin because Jake has been taken to hospital with chest pains.

Ivy is relieved when he comes to find her and reassure her that he is okay. He promises to be there when she competes in the talent show, which the others have managed to dodge. James Blunt appears as the celebrity judge and sings `You're Beautiful' over a montage of the other acts. Peering through the curtain, Ivy sees her parents, but she goes on stage anyway to do their Scissor Sisters routine, with her head being filled with highlights from her stay.

Afterwards, Ivy and her parents join Patrick and Lucy for her farewells. She thanks them for making her feel normal again. But Lucy tells her that she is suffering from grief hallucination in thinking she has seen Jake because he died of a heart attack. Despite his photograph now being on Patrick's wall. she refuses to believe he's gone and runs to Jake's cabin to find his stuff has been removed. Ella comes to console her and reminds her that he loved her.

Two weeks later, Karen tells Ivy about how grieving works and assures her that she will always remember how she felt about Jake, even though she will eventually stop being crushed by his loss. She opens a memory box sent by Ella and watches the video of their time at camp and she runs the gamut as she watches the footage (which plays under the closing credits).

A lively performance by Ruby Stokes holds this uneven drama together. Having watched his mother beat cancer as a teenager, Jaques is well versed in how the disease impacts upon loved ones, as well as survivors. Whenever the focus falls on the psychological consequences, the screenplay is astute and compassionate, with Bella Ramsey doing a splendid job in conveying the range of emotions that Ivy has to endure in the course of her journey.

But things tend to happen too quickly for the action to seem plausible. Ivy appears far too deeply entrenched in the fallout from 10 months of remission to suddenly become a jolly member of the cool kids inside seven days. Similarly, her romance with Jake comes out of nowhere in terms of screen time, while the passage from a casual mention of chest pains to a fatal cardiac arrest is so melodramatically abrupt it feels clumsily manipulative. Jaques also struggles to convince with the grief hallucination section, which particularly strains when Ralph hugs Ivy, with Ella, Archie, and Maisie looking on, with Jake being in the same medium shot - which makes no sense because he would only be visible to Ivy in a point-of-view shot.

Daniel Quinn-Toye and Conrad Khan create nice boys that any mother would love, while Earl Cave enjoys playing the wild card. But Jasmine Elcock is given little to do, while there is no sense of any other kids at the centre beyond the core sextet. This makes camp life look very dull and impacts upon the adult cast members, whose characters are never developed beyond their connection with the principals.

Neil Patrick Harris does his best with a poorly written role, as Patrick veers between cringe-inducing mateyness and stern strictness without showing much empathy for his charges or any great aptitude for running a `chemo camp'. And Jessica Gunning is similarly hamstrung, particularly in the painfully contrived drop-off sequence, in which Karen adopts a cool mum persona to interact with the bemused teens in a way in which no right-thinking parent would ever do.

Jaques and cinematographer Oliver Loncraine make effective use of the Scottish locales, but there's no sense of the CRF Camp, as the cabins look like they have been dropped down in a convenient spot for filming rather than as part of a planned compound. The fairground also has a low-budget indie feel, while the barney with the local kids is a feeble contrivance that comes with no consequences for the gang and no insights into how the community views having the camp on its doorstep. Such observations may seem trivial, but they add up and undermine a project to which the cast and crew were clearly committed. The message that there's more to a person than the condition they're living with is eminently sound. But, sometimes, good intentions are not enough.

HOLY DAYS.

South African actress Nat Boltt makes her directorial debut with Holy Days, which she has adapted from a novel by New Zealand author, Dame Joy Crowley. Closer in spirit to Laurent Tirard's Oh My Goodness! (2022) than Warwick Thornton's The New Boy (2023), this could have been a fine showcase for its venerable leads. But it never quite gels, in spite of the willing performances.

Sister Agnes (Judy Davis), Sister Mary Clare (Jacki Weaver), and Sister Luke (Miriam Margolyes) are the last three nuns in what used to be a thriving mother and baby refuge in a small New Zealand town. Young Brian Collins (Elijah Tamati) likes visiting because his late mother felt comfortable there. But he is also keen to get away from his father, Joe (Craig Hall), and his new girlfriend, Liz (Nat Boltt). So, he claims to have uttered some `blasphemery' so that Sister Agnes can give him a penance. This time, it's cleaning the upstairs floors with Sister Mary Clare, who shows him how to skid on the polish in his socks.

After causing a row at the Christmas dinner table, Brian hides in his mother's wardrobe. Joe gives him her snow globe of the Maori mountain that his mother claimed was the stepping stone to the afterlife and Brian hopes to go there after catching his father and Liz packing away his mum's clothes. He escapes on his bike and sobs in the church, where no one thinks of looking when they search for him. Thus, he overhears Fr Findlay (Jonny Brugh) being told by Bishop Chaytor (John Bach) to get the nuns out so they can sell the land to a shady developer. As Luke has dementia, they also plan dumping her in a care home.

Brian tells the sisters and they borrow Findlay's car to retrieve the deeds to the land that are being held in trust by nun-turned-lawyer, Patricia, who happens to be the boy's great aunt. They get Joe's permission for Brian to travel to South Island and set off with Agnes driving very slowly using Mary Clare's glasses. Using a fruit cake to bribe the ticket official at the ferry terminal, the nuns spend the night in the car and wake to find Luke up to her elbows in guts with some fishermen. She's less than happy when they discover that their old convent has been closed down as part of the bishop's scheme and Mary Clare wanders on to the beach to tell Brian that she has been betrayed before because her mother left her with the sisters when she was a child and never returned.

Her wallow is interrupted by Luke wading into the sea and they see the funny side of their situation. This improves when Agnes finds Findlay's betting slip for a big horse race in the glove compartment and they cash in his winnings. They check into a hotel for the night and Brian tells his mum that he's coming to the mountain so he can join her in Heaven. But he's dismayed when the snow globe gets broken when Luke resists being taken out of the backseat to go to the loo. Despite cars honking in a long line because Agnes is going so slowly (cut to a claymation traffic jam), they reach Patricia (Tanea Heke) and she is delighted to see her niece's son.

Meanwhile, Findlay has discovered that developer Harry Greaves (Colin Moy) intends knocking his presbytery down and he seeks out Joe to see if he knows where the nuns have gone. When Joe and Liz stay shtum, the priest tells them what the bishop is plotting and they are appalled.

While Patricia consults the paperwork, Mary Clare and Agnes get Brian to dance to Aretha Franklin's `Are You Sure?' She gives him his mother's pendant and Mary Clare suggests visiting the mountain that had meant so much to Paula and her family. While they are sleeping, however, Findlay calls Patricia to tell her that he has signed a document he should not have and she warns him that he will be homeless if the nuns are. She also tells Agnes that they should never have left (they had to come because Luke pulled the phone out of the wall) because residency alone gives them the right to stay.

Detouring to the mountain, where Brian has gone to find his mother, Paula (Renaye Tamati) appears to him and reminds him that he owes Liz an apology and that he can't keep her waiting. The nuns find the boy huddled against the cold and they set off to return to North Island with the clock ticking fast. With Mary Clare putting her tractor-driving talents to the test, they race some stoners in a VW van, pray that the fuel holds out until they can reach a filling station, and bribe a motorcycle cop to escort them to the ferry (shown crossing in claymation again). Dropping Brian off so he can apologise to Liz, the nuns get home as midday strikes and the locals stop Greaves from taking possession so that Agnes and Mary Clare can retuen from their `holiday'. As they celebrate, however, Sister Luke dies sitting in her beloved garden.

Time passes and Brian gets his snow globe repaired. He is sitting by his mother's grave when Sister Agnes finds him to say she now believes in miracles and has come to realise that death is just another journey to be undertaken without fear. They join the rest of the guests at Joe and Liz's wedding, with Fr Findlay and Mary Clare dancing with gusto. As the credits roll, a claymation summation of the trip home plays until Brian arrives home on his bike.

Quite why actresses of the calibre of Judy Davis and Jacki Weaver would want to participate in this modest road movie is a puzzle. But they give of their best in a comedy that's rarely funny, but never less than genial. Jokes about Sister Agnes nipping off for a cheeky smoke and Sister Luke breaking wind and losing her false teeth raise no more than indulgent smiles. But Davis, Weaver, and Miriam Margolyes create a palpable sense of a close-knit sisterhood and they are more than generous in their interaction with Elijah Tamati, the perky newcomer whose own mother plays Paula in the touching mountain-top sequence.

It's uncertain whether the odd glitches in the storyline are down to the Capracorny source novel or Nat Boltt's adaptation. If the nuns are so well regarded in the town, surely someone would have let them use their phone to call Patricia after Luke pulls the cord out of the wall? Similarly, how long have the trio been at the former mother/baby hostel (the social shift alone would seem to suggest several decades), as their reaction to finding St Helen's closed on South Island implies that they spent a fair amount of time there, too? Indeed, they seem to have a greater affection for this ramshackle pile than they do for their own abode, which is never made to seem particularly cherished. We also never learn much about their backstories and why Agnes and Luke respectively speak in Irish and Scottish accents.

Such quibbles aside, this is a pleasant enough ride. Thomas Burstyn's views of the passing scenery give a flavour of the Kiwi landscape, while he also conveys the cocooning cosiness of the car. The road sequences are occasionally leavened by the charming stop-motion interludes animated by Ty Jepson using miniatures created by Chris Reddington. The soundtrack choices are also astutely embedded in the score composed by Karl Sölve Steven of the funk outfit, Supergroove.

Despite struggling to achieve a tonal balance between comedy and drama, Boltt directs steadily enough, although her script meanders a little, especially in cutting back to show Fr Findlay and the bishop conniving with the contractor. She turns in a nice performance, however, as the stepmother-in-waiting who completely understands why Brian would rather have his mum. The notion of grieving is delicately handled, as are the sections on parental responsibiliy, belonging, ageing, being put out to pasture, and belief in both God and the institutional side of religion. While occasionally trading in Sister Actisms, the film also reminds us of the good that nuns do in their communities. But it also notes in the happy ending that Agnes and Luke are no spring chooks and that, in the unlikelihood of there being any local vocations, Bishop Chaytor is bound to win in the end, as he's hardly likely to send any novices their way to keep up the good work.