What with death duties, being rich hardly seems worthwhile.

The Avengers

3.9: The Undertakers

Mac Hulke is back, and – surprise, surprise – brings an underlying political theme along to his teleplay. It’s a good one, but despite some decent performances (Lally Bowers, in particular, is hilarious) it doesn’t quite make the most of its conceit.

Steed: Is he going into retirement for the rest of his life?

Mrs Renter: Yes, that’s what retirement is.

The rotters this time have a ruse to enable the wealthy, or potentially wealthy, to avoid death duties by pretending their spouses are not yet deceased but rather have gone into retreat (and meditation, in Mr Renter’s case) at the Adelphi Retirement Home. As Cathy explains to Steed, if property is signed over less than five years before death, then duties are still payable (“Not exactly evasion. It’s perfectly legal”); as such, those investing need to keep their relatives alive for five years, “on the books at least” (just to make sure this has gone in, it’s explained to us again about five minutes later; it’s not that complicated).

Mrs Renter: What with death duties, being rich hardly seems worthwhile.

As dodgy as this is, when you hear Mrs Renter explaining that out of £1m she will have to pay £800k in duties, you can see her reasoning (“She actually believes what we’re doing is morally right”). Aside from being delightfully dippy, though, it’s difficult to see how she got away without being charged at the end of all this.

Elsewhere, we have Florence+ The Machine-alike Paula (Jan Holden), less than saddened by her husband’s passing, since she gets to carry on with Lomax (Lee Patterson, an actual American playing an unconvincing American, which takes some doing), while the deceased’s daughter (Mandy Miller) causes her nuisance. There’s funeral Director Green (Howard Gorney, the sneezing superintendent in Girl on the Trapeze), whom Steed fails to sell up-to-date grave care (“We are able to provide a funeral service fit for any standard of living”) and the man behind it all, Madden (Patrick Holt).

As one might expect, the scheme bears little scrutiny in the fine print; an actor is employed to impersonate Mr Renter, and will be bumped off in due course. How many such operations do the instigators expect to get away with, and how high will the overheads go? Madden amusingly emerges from a coffin at several points in a manner that may well have inspired the more outrageously grave-focussed Bizarre.

The outdoor climax goes on a bit, as Green and Wilkinson shoot (ineptly) at Steed in the grounds of the home while the latter fondles statues of naked nymphs (as he sweatily recounts to Cathy in the final scene, “They were very big girls”). An enjoyable episode as far as it goes, but The Undertakers falls a bit short on the diabolical villainy front.

Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.

Comments

Maybe the dingo ate your baby.

Seinfeld 2.9: The Stranded The Premise George and Elaine are stranded at a party in Long Island, with a disgruntled hostess.

Nanobots aren’t just for Christmas.

No Time to Die (2021) (SPOILERS) You know a Bond movie is in trouble when it resorts to wholesale appropriation of lines and even the theme song from another in order to “boost” its emotional heft. That No Time to Die – which previewed its own title song a year and a half before its release to resoundingly underwhelmed response, Grammys aside – goes there is a damning indictment of its ability to eke out such audience investment in Daniel Craig’s final outing as James (less so as 007). As with Spectre , the first half of No Time to Die is, on the whole, more than decent Bond fare, before it once again gets bogged down in the quest for substance and depth from a character who, regardless of how dapper his gear is, resolutely resists such outfitting.

Twenty dwarves took turns doing handstands on the carpet.

Bugsy (1991) (SPOILERS) Bugsy is very much a Warren Beatty vanity project (aren’t they all, even the ones that don’t seem that way on the surface?), to the extent of his playing a title character a decade and a half younger than him. As such, it makes sense that producer Warren’s choice of director wouldn’t be inclined to overshadow star Warren, but the effect is to end up with a movie that, for all its considerable merits (including a script from James Toback chock full of incident), never really feels quite focussed, that it’s destined to lead anywhere, even if we know where it’s going.

Big things have small beginnings.

Prometheus (2012) Post- Gladiator , Ridley Scott opted for an “All work and no pondering” approach to film making. The result has been the completion of as many movies since the turn of the Millennium as he directed in the previous twenty years. Now well into his seventies, he has experienced the most sustained period of success of his career. For me, it’s also been easily the least-interesting period. All of them entirely competently made, but all displaying the machine-tooled approach that was previously more associated with his brother.

Beer is for breakfast around here. Drink or begone.

Cocktail (1988) (SPOILERS) When Tarantino claims the 1980s (and 1950s) as the worst movie decade, I’m inclined to invite him to shut his butt down. But should he then flourish Cocktail as Exhibit A, I’d be forced to admit he has a point. Cocktail is a horrifying, malignant piece of dreck, a testament to the efficacy of persuasive star power on a blithely rapt and undiscerning audience. Not only is it morally vacuous, it’s dramatically inert. And it relies on Tom’s toothy charms to a degree that would have any sensitive soul rushed to the A&E suffering from toxic shock (Tom’s most recently displayed toothy charms will likely have even his staunchest devotees less than sure of themselves, however, as he metamorphoses into your favourite grandma). And it was a huge box office hit.

Isn’t sugar better than vinegar?

Femme Fatale (2002) (SPOILERS) Some have attempted to rescue Femme Fatale from the dumpster of critical rejection and audience indifference with the claim that it’s De Palma’s last great movie. It isn’t that by a long shot, but it might rank as the last truly unfettered display of his obsessions and sensibilities, complete with a ludicrous twist – so ludicrous, it’s either a stroke of genius or mile-long pile up.

It's something trying to get out.

The Owl Service (1969-70) I may have caught a glimpse of Channel 4’s repeat of The Owl Service in 1987, but not enough to stick in the mind. My formative experience was Alan Garner’s novel, which was read several years earlier during English lessons. Garner’s tapestry of magical-mythical storytelling had an impact, with its possession theme and blending of legend with the here and now. Garner depicts a Britain where past and present are mutable, and where there is no safety net of objective reality; life becomes a strange waking dream. His fantasy landscapes are both attractive and disturbing; the uncanny reaching out from the corners of the attic. But I have to admit that the themes of class and discrimination went virtually unnoticed in the wake of such high weirdness. The other Garner books I read saw young protagonists transported to fantasy realms. The resonance of The Owl Service came from the fragmenting of the rural normal. When the author notes that he neve

Who’s got the Figgy Port?

Loki (2021) (SPOILERS) Can something be of redeemable value and shot through with woke (the answer is: Mad Max: Fury Road )? The two attributes certainly sound essentially irreconcilable, and Loki ’s tendencies – obviously, with new improved super-progressive Kevin Feige touting Disney’s uber-agenda – undeniably get in the way of what might have been a top-tier MCU entry from realising its full potential. But there are nevertheless solid bursts of highly engaging storytelling in the mix here, for all its less cherishable motivations. It also boasts an effortlessly commanding lead performance from Tom Hiddleston; that alone puts Loki head and shoulders above the other limited series thus far.

These are not soda cans you asked me to get for you.

The Devil’s Own (1997) (SPOILERS) Naturally, a Hollywood movie taking the Troubles as a backdrop is sure to encounter difficulties. It’s the push-pull of wanting to make a big meaningful statement about something weighty, sobering and significant in the real world and bottling it when it comes to the messy intricacies of the same. So inevitably, the results invariably tend to the facile and trite. I’m entirely sure The Devil’s Own would have floundered even if Harrison Ford hadn’t come on board and demanded rewrites, but as it is, the finished movie packs a lot of talent to largely redundant end.

Did you not just hand over a chicken to someone?

The Father (2020) (SPOILERS) I was in no great rush to see The Father , expecting it to be it to be something of an ordeal in the manner of that lavishly overpraised euthanasia-fest Amour. As with the previous Oscars, though, the Best Picture nominee I saw last turned out to be the best of the bunch. In that case, Parasite , its very title beckoning the psychic global warfare sprouting shoots around it, would win the top prize. The Father , in a year of disappointing nominees, had to settle for Best Actor. Ant’s good, naturally, but I was most impressed with the unpandering manner in which Florian Zeller and Christopher Hampton approached material that might easily render one highly unstuck.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

Search This Blog