Review by Daniel Mortlock:
The first of this week's two big releases from the Remnants Cinematic Universe (MCU) is Remnants vs. Bassingbourn (2023, dir. Daniel Mortlock & James Robinson), to be followed tomorrow by Remnants vs. The Philanderers (2023, dir. James Robinson and Ed Dobson). The first thing to say here is that it's simply too much: with two of these so-called epics scheduled every week for the whole summer, there's just no chance of the average fan being able to keep up; and, sadly, it's not clear that they'd want to given what I saw tonight.
Remnants vs. Bassingbourn was billed as some sort of homecoming, with four of the visiting side (James Robinson, Max Ayliffe, Mike Foulkes and Tim Simmance, who appeared only due to some last-minute re-casting) all having played roles for Remnants in the past. This could have been an effective dramatic device, as evidenced by the decision to have Max and Mike open the bowling for Bassingbourn. Perhaps the one moment of genuinely balanced tension in the whole production was when they conceded just 4 and 5 runs off their opening overs, although it was verging on the implausible that this was achieved by having TK (played with conviction by Temoor Khan) remain scoreless off his first five deliveries. But perhaps this played badly with the Remnants fans who have been bank-rolling this series, as there was a sudden jump-cut into a different world in which TK smashed 32 runs off the next 11 (legal) deliveries he faced. This meant he was within one shot of what would have been a fan-pleasing moment of coming off the ground undefeated on the retirement score of 40 . . . but the viewers were denied this by giving Tim Simmance his most prominent moment by bowling TK (for 38 off 22 balls).
There followed the desperate directorial tactic of a montage - all that was missing with the classic '80s power-ballad soundtrack - in which the Remnants batting heroes new and old were given their fan moments: Seb Hammersley (17 off 20 balls); Stephen Doel (19 off 21 balls, which fan boys immediately noted gave him a season's batting average, 136.00); and Cam Petrie (17* off 19 balls) all played their usual crowd pleasing shots, but by the short format were denied the chance to put in the sort of memorable performance that might see them nominated for a quiz question at the annual dinner. Slightly more time was devoted to Marcus Baker's dramatic arc: he is first seen refusing his captain's request to bat high up the order, although the depth of his protests about being out of form were more than was needed to get the point across; then, at the fall of the first wicket, he tried to offer his spot to Stephen; and then finally, like Tom Cruise's "Maverick" at the end of Top Gun (1984, dir. Tony Scott) he had no choice but to face his inner demons, who were conquered in a barnstorming 37* off 28 balls. (One presumes that the implied final shot of him making it to 40 was the victim of a last-minute cut.)
The intermission was a chance to think a bit more closely about the aesthetic aspects of Remnants vs. Bassingbourn, which were dominated by the grey palette of the low clouds that had, possibly in post-production, been made to hover over the ground.
By this stage all dramatic tension had long-since vanished, and so it was no surprise that the cliches came along almost too fast to register.
Overall, it's hard to go past Andy Owen's recent review of The Banshees of Inisherin (2022, dir. Martin McDonagh), in which he suggested the only bit was where one of the characters cuts off his own fingers, and that if he'd been watching at home he would have "gone off and done something else".