Back in 2007, Tom Basden and Tim Key wrote and starred in a quirky short(ish) film entitled The One and Only Herb McGwyer Plays Wallis Island, directed by James Griffith. Now, 18 years later, Basden, Key and Griffith have reunited for an expanded version of their work which only benefits from the passage of time given that it is a bittersweet comedy about sad men and lost pasts.
With an opening that recalls Jim Hoskin’s Ebony and Ivory (2024), washed-up folk musician Herb McGwyer (Basden) washes up on remote Wallis Island, where he has been hired by mysterious benefactor – and similar loner – Charles Heath (Key) to put on a concert for a very large sum of cash. What Herb does not know is that Heath has also hired Nell Mortimer (Carey Mulligan), Herb’s former singing partner from his musical peak and also his ex lover, to come along, and that this one-off reunion concert is intended for an audience of one.
Nell arrives with birdwatching husband Michael (Akemnji Ndifornyen) in tow, and much awkward comedy ensues between these four mismatched characters and local shopkeeper/single mother Amanda (Sian Clifford). It is a tale of love, loneliness and loss, in which a failing artist goes back to his roots, and a self-isolated widower ever so tentatively returns to society. For in this desolate, beautiful space, no man is an island (although Wallis Island’s vistas are certainly spectacular). The Ballad of Wallis Island is also, thanks to the immense charm of the cast, very very funny, and for all its retrospective nostalgia, allows its characters at last to float their wishes for the future and to look forward.
strap: James Griffith’s folk comedy plays the old tunes of love, loss and loneliness between two musicians and a big fan
© Anton Bitel
