Overview
Eccentric lottery winner Charles lives alone on a remote island but dreams of hiring his favourite musician, Herb McGwyer, to play an exclusive, private gig. Unbeknownst to Herb, Charles has also hired Herb’s ex-bandmate and ex-girlfriend, Nell, with her new husband in town, to perform the old favourites. As tempers flare and old tensions resurface, the stormy weather traps them all on the island and Charles desperately looks for a way to salvage his dream gig.
A comedy drama co-written by the stars Tom Basden and Tim Key, Ballad of Wallis Island is a charming and poignant tale of isolation, wealth, the pursuit of happiness, lost love, and the price of fame all bundled together with a small cast in a remote location.
Tom Basden plays Herb McGwyer, one half of a past folk duo who has become a more commercially styled solo artist after the duo split. His partner in the duo was Nell Mortimer (Carey Mulligan), and the pair were not only a professional partnership, but romantically involved too, with their personal break-up being the catalyst for them to separate professionally and never see each other again. Enter Tim Key as Charles Heath, an eccentric widower who had a lucky win on the lottery, and so has more money than he knows what to do with. Living on the remote Wallis Island, Charles lives an isolated life, listening mostly to old McGwyer Mortimer folk records, and so he books Herb to play an exclusive gig on the island with an audience of one – himself. However Charles didn’t want the solo artist, so has also booked Nell to reunite the pair, which is sure to bring back some unresolved conflicts of their past.
This is a wonderfully warm film that never devolves into outright sentimentality, and instead carries itself along and through the various themes with a lifting glow. From the early act with the increasingly frustrated Herb finding his perception of what a star he is being challenged by the socially awkward behaviours of Charles – an almost obsessively and stalker-ish ‘number one fan’ but without ever feeling sinister – to the mid act when Nell arrives and their history is explored, to the final act where Charles is forced to reflect on who he is, this is a film about life, and identity, and the external factors that push us into our own little worlds, and how we need others to bring us back out again. The humour is wonderful, with Key playing to his quirky strengths in subtle ways, but also in sometimes joyously farcical ways, but the laughs never muscle their way into the more heartfelt moments, and never distract from the deeper charm the tale has to offer.
With the addition of original music penned and sung for the film by Basden and Mulligan, the end result is a delight of a film that will touch your heart, and remain in your mind long after the end credits and final song play out.