Look, Allelujah is… well… it’s… a bit baffling, truth be told.
I’m well up for anything containing Jennifer Saunders, Dame Judy Dench and Russell Tovey so I didn’t need to be asked twice to see this one. Whilst funny here and there, it’s not a comedy, so don’t go along to this thinking you’ll see Jennifer Saunders at her comedic best. Dramatic best? Sure. But even her dramatic acting skills can’t save this film from the very puzzling change of tone, direction etc about three quarters of the way through! Honestly, it was like it became a completely different film with the shift sign-posted with a melodramatic change in music just to make sure you understand ‘things are now BAD’. And then even if you could go along with the ‘things are now BAD’ gear change, there was yet another super weird gear shift where one of the characters in the film talked down the barrel of the camera about the importance of the National Health Service in the UK. It was thematically linked to the film but it’d be like Harold Bishop delivering a monologue about the value of the Salvos for the last few minutes of an episode of Neighbours! The audience is left to think, well, sure, but that’s a completely weird way to end Neighbours, WTF!
I concur with this two star review in The Guardian which you can read if you’d like to know more about the film. (When I’ve told you I think it’s baffling and not worth seeing it seems pointless to go into the plot … cut to the chase & all that!) In the interests of balance, here’s a four star review from The Telegraph UK
Allelujah opens April 6, runs 99 minutes (YESSSS) and is yet to be classified.