‘Brian and Charles’: Film Review

Sheri Linden
·5 min read

Brian Gittins, the bearded and bespectacled oddball played by David Earl in Brian and Charles, might strike you at first as a scruffy Welsh cousin of Marc Maron. And as he leads an unseen documentarian on a tour through the hodgepodge in his converted cowshed, the place where he turns flotsam and jetsam into items of questionable utility — a belt for carrying eggs, an air-suctioning mask, a flying cuckoo clock — you might find yourself waiting for a satiric blade to slice through the homey clutter. But as the story proceeds, zeroing in on Brian’s bond with his latest invention, a gangly 7-foot contraption with an endearing personality, a strange calm settles over the proceedings: This is an irony-free zone, and Brian and Charles, too nuanced to feel like a kids’ movie, is all-ages fare in the very best sense, free of condescension or frenetic contortions.

That extra-tall robot is played by Chris Hayward, hidden within an elaborately rough-hewn costume (one of Gabriela Yiaxis’ ace contributions) and speaking with enchanting mechanical inflections, not unlike an openhearted HAL 9000. Screenwriters Earl and Hayward developed the characters on the U.K. stand-up circuit and in a 2017 short, whose director, Jim Archer, takes the helm here as well. His affection for the awkward, charming duo shapes their every exchange with a light, natural touch. As the characters navigate a friendship tinged with parent-child dynamics, Archer and DP Murren Tullett draw upon the atmospherics of the remote, bucolic setting — the feature was shot in the Snowdonia region of northwestern Wales.

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“I was very low” is all the backstory we get from Brian, and it’s setup enough for his determination to “get busy” and make something (fine advice for down-in-the-dumps humans in general). Why someone with a camera is following him around is never explained, but you might imagine a wannabe filmmaker in search of local color and drawn to Brian’s quirky creativity. In an isolated ancient village set among fields of sheep, Brian lives in a stone house called Plox Green Cottage, his only company a mouse called Mr. Williams. It’s easy to assume that he’s lived there all his life; Hannah Purdy Foggin’s unflamboyant production design brims with weathered mementos of Brian’s parents and remnants of his own letdowns and hopes.

Not unlike Frankenstein’s monster, Brian’s ungainly creation comes alive during a thunderstorm. And like him, he’s an innocent, although he’ll fast-track through the terrible twos to the rebellious teens. With his mannequin head, boxy washing-machine torso, cardigan, bow tie, receding hairline of gray curls, and endless curiosity, he’s an elderly child. In short order he has read the dictionary from cover to cover and is flaunting a pretty nifty vocabulary. He christens himself Charles Petrescu, having made clear his distaste for a couple of names suggested by Brian, and he quickly develops a fondness for cabbage. How he gets it down his mannequin gullet is anyone’s guess.

There’s a touch of Geppetto and Pinocchio in the bond between these two. Grateful for the company, Brian beams, in his understated way, with parental pride. “I never thought I’d make anything as amazing as Charles,” he admits, and his darting glances at the camera, as if to say “Are you catching this?,” dial down a tired cliché of mockumentary grammar and replace it with something unfeigned.

As the garrulous toddler turns into a petulant adolescent, Brian’s protectiveness toward Charles, who longs for adventure — Hawaii, glimpsed on the TV, really grabs him — is reasonable, not pathological. Danger lurks in the form of the Tommingtons, a family of meanies who have caught wind of the talking, dancing robot. They’re the kind who take what they want. Horrid teenage sisters (Lowri Izzard and Mari Izzard) yelp their demands, and the brutish Eddie Tommington (Jaime Michie) and slightly less malevolent Pam (Nina Sosanya) jump at the chance to bully whoever’s standing in their way.

Cowed at first, Brian wades into danger to save Charles from these villains, but more important than Eddie’s comeuppance or the action heroics — the gentle pluckiness of Daniel Pemberton’s score giving way to a taut suspense pulse — is the encouragement and serious help Brian receives in this hour of need from Hazel (Louise Brealey), a neighbor who lives with her controlling grouch of a mother (Lynn Hunter). She’s as shy, socially clumsy and lonely as Brian, their fumbling conversations signaling that they’d both like to take things a step further, but neither knows how. It’s Charles, whether in his robot intuition or sheer gregariousness, who breaks the ice and draws her into Brian’s life.

The performances by Brealey, Earl and Hayward are terrifically sweet and sincere, in sync with the film’s unaffected attitude of silly but serious. The magic that Brian and Charles taps into is handwrought and underplayed, with Archer letting the weird details cast a low-key glow. The way Charles pronounces Brian’s name, in a single syllable, has the irresistible pull of an accidental mantra. His declaration, early in his existence, that “everything is lovely,” is, well, lovely. And though he’ll learn that life isn’t quite so simple, he remains a fine exemplar of opening up and letting go. I only hope that the cabbage-loving Charles Petrescu’s travels end better than those of Hitchbot.

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