Review: The History Boys

UK Release: 13th October 2006

Alan Bennett’s hit stage play, about a group of Sheffield grammar school boys being drilled for their Oxbridge entrance exams, makes an efficient transition to the big screen.

Utilising the original stage cast, director Nicholas Hytner wisely opts to change as little as possible, resisting the urge to open up the material cinematically. This brilliantly serves Bennett’s screenplay, which is a masterpiece of wit and intellectual erudition worn feather-lightly; a perfectly balanced blend undercut with the darker subject of history teacher Hector (Richard Griffiths) and his sexual attraction to the boys.

Which leads to this thoroughly enjoyable film’s only flaw: there’s something slightly implausible about these pupils who combine a kind of romanticised notion of male adolescence extracted from Goodbye Mr Chips with an incredible nonchalance towards the subject of homosexuality and their teacher’s repeated attempts to cop a feel. Still, it’s not a documentary, and this niggle is more than made up for by the performances, which are uniformly first-rate.

Radio Times rating:

****

UK cinema certificate 15
Running time 109mins

Review by Adam Smith

News: The History Boys

Since opening at London’s National Theatre in May 2004, Alan Bennett’s play has been performed in Hong Kong, New Zealand and on BBC Radio 3 and Broadway, where it picked up six prizes at this year’s Tony Awards.

Now, however, after more than 500 sold out performances, and with the original cast all captured on celluloid for eternity, all the actors are moving on to pastures new, letting fresh faces have a go at making the roles their own. So if you’ve missed it at the theatre, best head to the cinema now…