Alan Bennett?s play has been an exceptional success everywhere it?s been. Broadway, the West End, runs in Sydney and Hong Kong, a worldwide smash, and no doubt rightly so. The writing is witty and incisive, and gives the audience a real sense of the English School system in Thatcher?s England. It tells the story of a group of students who sit the ?Seventh semester?, an extra term of lessons to prepare them for the entrance examinations for Cambridge and Oxford. We follow each of the boys and their teachers through the process, with a particular emphasis placed on the grossly different teaching styles of the three masters in the play. From the ?facts, facts facts? method of instruction from Frances De La Tour?s Mrs. Linott (a BAFTA nominated performance), to Richard Griffith?s dated ?Hector?, a teacher who believes more in his pupils being able to recite poetry rather than learn the curriculum. These investigations and characterizations are interesting, but this is entirely because of the script, which is essentially the same used as that in the play. As a film, however, The History Boys is a tawdry, rather dry affair, that fails to successfully adapt to its new medium. Effectively it?s like watching a play, and the decision to use the original play?s cast only further exacerbates this sensation. They sit in pre determined poses, that are held without movement for the full duration of sometimes painfully long soliloquies. The lines are delivered with the projection required in the Queen?s Theatre, but which is out of place here. It?s frustrating that director Hynter hasn?t made use of all the extra luxuries afforded to him by directing the film instead of the play. The producers seem to have been so wrapped up in making sure they re-created the play?s ?magic?, by reassembling the cast and director, that they overlooked the shortcomings of such a strategy. A filmed play is a wasted exercise, and that is ultimately what the film feels like. The dialogue, though clever, is unnatural, the film offers nothing new, in fact it offers less than the play, as there is none of the enjoyment of live theatre to ameliorate the experience. All that can be gleaned from this is a sense of what might have been.

out of ten

Reviewed by Nick Bailey