A Voyage Round My Father

Synopsis: Before creating the beloved courtroom drama Rumpole of the Bailey, writer John Mortimer found inspiration in his own life for this portrait of a difficult but enduring love between father and son in mid-20th-century Britain. Screen legend Laurence Olivier stars as the eccentric patriarch--a blind barrister so stubborn and cantankerous that he refuses to acknowledge his sightlessness. Alan Bates (Gosford Park) portrays his devoted son, who follows his father's footsteps in the law while longing to become a writer, with Jane Asher (Brideshead Revisited) as his wife. Adapted for the screen by Mortimer himself and filmed largely on location at his family estate in bucolic Oxfordshire, this production garnered multiple awards, including an International Emmy for best drama. By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, it captures the special bond between father and son, which at times seems unbearable--but ultimately unbreakable.

Genre: Drama

Director(s): Alvin Rakoff

Actors: Laurence Olivier, Alan Bates, Jane Asher, Elizabeth Sellars

4 wins & 5 nominations.


IMDB:: 7.9

Collection Edit Watch PDF Buy

: NOT RATED
Year:: 1982
: 90 min
: 10 Views

FATHER:
Brokenhearted milkman,
in grief I'm arrayed
For keeping on the company
of a young servant maid
- [ Bee buzzing]
- Bring that saw, will you, boy?
Out of the barrow.
Who lived on board wages
and a house to keep clean
In a gentleman's family
in Paddington Green
Here, boy.
SON:
My father wasn't always blind.
[ Gasps 1
He hi! His head
on the branch of a tree,
and the retinas lei! The balls
of his eyes.
That's how I looked to my
father from childhood onwards.
That's how my wife
and his grandchildren looked.
Acorn Media
BOY:
Where are we going to sleep?
BOY 2:
I want to sleep
in Granddad's bedroom.
SON:
Nonsense! You're going to
sleep in the middle bedroom.
BOY 1:
I don't want to sleep
in the middle bedroom.
ELIZABETH:
You got the key?
I want to change her.
Oh. Uh...
Here.
[Door closes]
FATHER:
Trapped a few, boy?
SON:
Just a few.
FATHER:
Ah. That will teach them
to feast on our dahlias.
Put them to the slaughter.
Sow;
All right.
Dahlias are all right, are they?
Yes.
Will you describe them for me?
Well, they're red... yellow.
Blowsy.
Go on, tell me frankly.
Middle-aged, are they?
Past it, eh?
Well...
Oh, go on.
You paint me the picture.
[ Chuckles ]
You be my eyes, huh?
[ Chuckles ]
My father was blind,
but we never mentioned it.
He had a great disinclination
to mention anything unpleasant.
What was that?
Courage?
Cowardice?
Indifference?
Or caring too completely?
Made it?
Have we?
Good?
0K8'!-
Why didn't he blaspheme?
Beat his head against the
pitch-black walls around him?
Why didn't he curse God?
He had a great capacity
for rage,
bu! Never a! The universe.
This egg is bloody runny!
It's in the most revolting
condition.
[ Coughs 1
What are you trying to do,
choke me to death?!
Have you all gone mad?!
Am I totally surrounded
by cretins?!
[ Breathing heavily]
In this six months, he married
this hardhearted girl
But he was not a Viscount,
and he was not an earl
He was not a baronet,
but a shade or two worse
'Twas the bowlegged conductor
of a tuppenny bus
The boy here?
- Yes, dear. He's here.
- Mm.
Don't let anyone ever
deceive you into believing
that the world was created
in six days.
Would you like your coffee now,
dear?
The evolution of the horse
was the most torturous process.
Mm.
This coffee's frozen.
Like a sort of Arctic mud.
Shall I make you some fresh,
dear?
Um... rather like it.
Six days' labor wouldn't even
evolve one primitive earthworm.
Have you got some more of that?
So none of this
six-days nonsense, hmm?
What are you trying to do now...
scald me to death?!
The three of us lived
in a small house surrounded,
as if for protection,
by an enormous garden.
My father was driven
to the station,
where he caught a train
to London
and his work as a barrister,
in a great hearse-like car,
which he would no more have
thought of replacing each year
than he would have accepted
a different kind of suit
or a new gardening hat.
Mr. Ringer Lean, who drove it,
treated the car as though
it were a nervous stallion.
Come on, me old beauty.
A bit frisky this morning.
Do you want a quick rubdown
with the Sporting Life?
There we are.
- Morning, ma'am.
- Good morning.
- Morning, gov.
- Ah. Lean.
The old Austin's gone
a bit lame today.
The going doesn't suit her.
It's a bit heavy.
Come on, me old beauty.
[Cane tapping]
MOTHER:
Just here.
Right.
FATHER:
Right.
[Whistle blows]
MOTHER:
"Report of Mr. Thong."
Bah!
Private detective.
All right. Go on.
Read it.
"Observation was commenced
Rate this script:(0.00 / 0 votes)