The Duke                             4 stars

If the bloody fighting of The Northman or the zany comedy of Everything Everywhere All at Once isn’t for you, perhaps you should try the British comedy, The Duke. Jim Broadbent, the character actor of so many fine films gets his chance at a starring role as Kempton Bunton, a friendly out spoken man who resents the fact that the government expects people to pay for their over the air TV shows and tells the TV police his views when they track him down in his rundown apartment. (I know that they do this in England as I heard about it from a British fellow once.) Kempton and his wife (Helen Mirren) are still aching from the death of their daughter many years earlier. We find out early in the light-hearted comedy that Bunton went on trial for theft. Eventually he concocts a bizarre plan to steal a famous painting of The Duke of Wellington from The British Art Gallery and hold it for ransom, demanding that the government make television free to the elderly. As if this isn’t bad enough, he involves his son in the half baked plot as well. This low key type of comedy with likeable characters should appeal to a wide range of audiences. Sadly, the director, Roger Michell, won’t be making anymore like this as he passed away last year. The movie was actually based on a true story that happened in 1961. It was the only successful robbery of the Art Gallery in history. If you enjoy British comedy you can’t go wrong with The Duke.