Withnail And I (DVD) > Reviews (24)

Sitting in the refectory at university, I began to feel like a fish out of water. Slowly, it dawned on me that I am not an alien from another planet, but that the main difference between my new friends and me was that I had never seen “Withnail and I”, and they knew the script verbatim!

Even a mature student, like me, finds time for fun and relaxation, so how could I refuse the offer of a Withnail evening at one of my new friends’ flats? The scene was set as I arrived, armed with a bottle of wine (unfortunately not a ‘53 Margaux) and an open mind; the table was filled with an array of wine bottles, cider by the gallon, bottles of gin and whisky and a bottle of Sherry that looked quite out of place.

Like a lamb to the slaughter, I accepted this initiation into the wonderful world of Withnail and I.

The film is set in an old, run down student flat in London’s Camden Town at the end of the 1960’s. Withnail and I (although the “I” character’s name is never mentioned in the film, the cognoscenti know his is Peter Marwood) are a couple of unemployed actors from different ends of the social spectrum.

Withnail is a Harrow educated dilettante, and rather upper crust; his flatmate Marwood is a grammar school boy with a slightly more serious outlook on life. To escape from the squalor of their grim, unemployed, existence in Camden Town, soaked in a near lethal cocktail of alcohol and drugs, the desperate couple call upon the generosity of Withnail’s uncle Montague and secure the use of his cottage in the country for a weekend.

Uncle Monty is an eccentric middle-aged homosexual, who prefers vegetables to flowers. He considers that “flowers are essentially tarts, prostitutes for the bees”, and wears a radish in his buttonhole in preference to a flower. He grows vegetables in pots in his Chelsea house, and makes suggestive references to “firm young carrots”.

Withnail and Marwood are safely on the road to Monty’s cottage near Penrith, some three hundred miles away in Cumbria, completely unaware that Monty intends to join them there and “take” Marwood, “even if it must be burglary”.

My hosts were, by now, were well into their “Withnail Game”. At each scene, quoting from the film, they drink what the characters drink, and say what they say. The quotes are amusing and memorable, indeed, there is hardly a line in the film that cannot be and is not used by my student friends in the course of a day! We had drunk wine, large gins, cider (ice in the cider) and sherry to a chorus of “Sherry?”, “Sherry”, Sherry?”, “Sherry”, “Sherry”. The only drink we had missed was lighter fluid, but even aficionados of the film can be excused, I’m sure!

“Withnail and I” eventually arrive at the cottage, and whilst Withnail despairs about the cold, the wet and the lack of modern conveniences, Marwood takes control and soon lights the paraffin lamps and gets a fire going in the hearth.

The following morning, we follow the couple (although they are not in a relationship, and probably not gay, they relate well to each other, and have a special empathy) on their quest for food, firewood and alcohol.

Having fallen out with Jake, the local poacher, they tremble with fear and join forces in one bed as they hear breaking glass and the sound of a knife being sharpened. This, they believe, is their moment of doom.

It transpires that Withnail (excellently played by Richard E. Grant), in order to secure the cottage for the weekend, has told uncle Monty (a superb Richard Griffiths) that Marwood (a convincing Paul McGann) is a “toilet trader” (a gentleman who importunes in public lavatories), and that is was not the poacher, but the voluble uncle who had arrived, with plentiful supplies of fine wine and food, to take advantage of his nephew’s friend.

Their exploits at the cottage, and in Penrith where they spend their Wellington boot money on booze and try to sober up in a gentile tearoom are memorable, witty and entertaining. The incongruous uncle Monty reciting Baudelaire in the Cumbrian hills, seeking carnal knowledge of Marwood (apparently coerced by the cowardly and treacherous Withnail), are testament to the writing skills and humour of author and director, Bruce Robinson.

The return trip to London, and their discovery of a “huge spade in the bath” and their drug dealer, Danny, squatting in their flat bring us more and more memorable lines, and more and more laughs. Only at the end of the film when Withnail and Marwood part company do we see compassion and sadness.

As Marwood departs to take up his new acting rôle, Withnail, standing in the rain, recites passionately from Shakespeare. For the first time we realise that he is, in fact, an excellent actor, and that only his excessive use of drink and drugs have held him back.

The film’s soundtrack brings us “A Whiter Shade of Pale”, played by King Curtis on the Saxophone, “My Friend” and “Walk hand in Hand”, performed by Charlie Kunz, “Schubert’s Piano Sonata in B Flat Major” performed by Leslie Pearson, “All Along the Watchtower” and “Voodoo Chile”, by Jimi Hendrix, “Hang Out the Stars in Indiana”, performed by Al Bowlly, and “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”, by the late lamented George Harrison, who provided much of the financial backing for this memorable film.

This is a thoroughly entertaining 108 minutes of humourous entertainment, suitable for broad-minded adults who enjoy the generous use of profanities and sexual innuendoes, a few too many drinks, a convincing 60’s atmosphere, superb performances from the excellent cast, and music to make your heart weep. Thank you, George Harrison.