ALLAN HUNTER at the Movies

JUDI DENCH’S remarkable run of Oscar recognition continues with ‘Notes On A Scandal’, for which she has earned her sixth nomination in nine years.

We have grown accustomed to Dench’s skill at playing woman of power and authority. Now she seizes the chance to play someone much less sympathetic; a devious, manipulative spinster schoolteacher whose aching loneliness leads her to some desperate acts.

Dench’s performance is the strong centre of an engrossing human drama that eventually runs out of steam. Based on the Zoe Heller bestseller, ‘Notes On A Scandal’ has been adapted for the screen by playwright Patrick Marber.

Dench plays Barbara, a respected schoolteacher who longs for companionship. She takes an instant shine to new art teacher Sheba (Cate Blanchett), and has soon wormed her way into the younger woman’s good graces, meeting her husband Richard (Bill Nighy) and their two children.

She is also the one who catches Sheba having sex with fifteen year-old pupil Steven (Andrew Simpson). Rather than reporting her colleague, she starts to relish the hold she has over the compromised Sheba.

‘Notes On A Scandal’ is well-acted by the entire cast and remains an engrossing, well-observed tale for the first hour or so. You really want to know what will happen next or when the trusting Sheba will realise the true nature of her so-called friend.

Unfortunately, as events unfold the tension starts to slacken, and there is a sense in which it slightly dodges the big moral issues in favour of a more conventional thriller-style plot.

The weak ending almost confines it to another entry in the Single White Female school of chillers, but the overall film is still very watchable.

Nationwide release

Director: Richard Eyre
Stars: Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, Bill Nighy, Andrew Simpson, Phil Davis, Michael Maloney, Anne-Marie Duff
Screenwriter: Patrick Marber from the novel by Zoe Heller
Certificate: 15
Running time: 91mins
Country: UK
Year: 2006

© Allan Hunter, 2007