Bennett’s hospital comedy

NOBODY writes gentle comedy quite like Alan Bennett and opening this week at the Henley Regal Picturehouse is the film version of his 2018 play about the staff and patients on a hospital geriatric ward.

Penned as Bennett’s tribute to the NHS, Allelujah (12A) is set in a Yorkshire cottage hospital under threat of closure and stars a line-up of veteran British acting talent.

Headed by Judi Dench as a retired librarian, the cast includes Derek Jacobi, Julia McKenzie and David Bradley playing patients who help the hospital fight back against the planned efficiencies.

Russell Tovey is the NHS management consultant and government adviser, whose ex-miner dad just happens to be one of the patients, with Jennifer Saunders as the formidable ward sister who has devoted her life to the NHS. When a concert is planned in honour of this distinguished nurse as she prepares for retirement, the hospital invites in a TV news crew to galvanise the local community in its fight for life.

Filmed in real hospitals in Wakefield and London, Allelujah is directed by Richard Eyre and adapted for the screen from Bennett’s play by Call the Midwife writer Heidi Thomas. It has a running time of one hour, 39 minutes.

Peckham forms the backdrop for Rye Lane (15) a black British romcom.

Rye Lane is a real street in the south London suburb where two youngsters, both recovering from bad break-ups, form a connection as they stroll around the local bars, shops and restaurants.

Vivian Oparah is Yas, a wannabe fashion designer who overhears heartbroken Dom (David Jonsson) sobbing in the next cubicle in a gender-neutral toilet.

The pair team up to face an unlikely lunch date with Dom’s glamorous ex and her new beau before landing themselves in some comedy scrapes as they open up to each other about their woeful love lives.

Including scenes shot in neighbouring Brixton, Rye Lane is directed by debutante director Raine Allen-Miller and has a running time of one hour, 22 minutes.

The Regal is also showing Oscar winners Everything, Everywhere, All The Time, The Whale, Women Talking and Navalny while What’s Love Got to Do With It? and Puss in Boots the Musical both continue.