London-born film-maker Dan Clark has made a half-wonderful satire that pokes fun at mendacious Tory politicians and deranged narcissists who’d do anything to get on TV (with Clark aware those two groups frequently overlap).
Niftily edited, it boasts a spry performance from Patrick Baladi as Richard “Hardline” Hardy, a posh, southern MP who is kidnapped during a trip up North by stroppy, cash-strapped, wannabe actress, Maggie (Kelly Wenham, of Coronation Street fame) and her sweetly insecure, taxi-driving boyfriend, Brian (Jack Parry Jones).
The couple, who’ve recklessly hired a B&B mansion for the week, assume Hardy’s wife will pay good money to get him back. They’re wrong. Hardy, delighted to find himself in the news, offers to pay the ransom himself. At which point, Brian goes off in search of food, Hardy and Maggie realise they have a few things in common, and a querulous neighbour appears (Leila Hoffman, typecast but splendidly vital). And that’s when kindness goes out the window.
It was easy to take Baladi for granted as Neil in The Office, seeming a bit one-note. But, he’s improved with age, ensuring that Hardy is a hilariously ghastly git, but also recognisably human. The character is not so much lucky as shameless, a quality that keeps cushionining his already robust self-esteem. The insatiable appetite for shagging. The lightning bolt flashes of something akin to wit. Baladi nails it all.
A Kind of Kidnapping begs and borrows from all kinds of classics, including Ruthless People and Shallow Grave, while Maggie’s punky style is surely a homage to that of Clementine Krucyznski, Kate Winslet’s character in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
But Clark’s film needs better direction, plotting and dialogue. There’s not one memorable camera-angle, inconsistencies abound (given that Hardy’s phone is working, why does it take the police so long to track him down?) and, for whole stretches at a time, Maggie’s every other word seems to be “dick!”
Wenham tries her best to hold the various narrative threads together. She’s a decent actress and when she’s forced to do pantomime-ish stuff you can’t help but wince. Jones - casually subtle, for most of the running time - is similarly ill-served by the end. It’s not a problem that the mood turns nasty. It’s a problem that the events don’t ring true.
In cinemas now and on digital platforms from 24th July
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