The idea of following your dream is a beguiling one.
After all, who of us hasn’t been stuck in a train on yet another grinding commute to a job we tolerate but don’t love and thought to ourselves “Life would be so much better if only I could …”
Dreams have a way of making things better but we suspect living them out would be better still, which is precisely what motivates opera singer aspirant Millie Cantwell (Danielle Macdonald), protagonist of charming British film, Falling For Figaro, to ditch her lucrative hedge fund manager job, where she is up for a prestigious promotion she doesn’t really want, and head to the wilds of quirky Highlands Scotland to train with the renowned but cantankerously demanding Meghan Geoffrey-Bishop (Joanna Lumley).
It’s a huge move, MOVE, as she leaves behind, for a year, a high-powered job, her loving but not as supportive as he could be boyfriend (and boss) Charlie (Shazad Latif) who, lamentably falls asleep in the same operas that move Millie deeply, and an apartment in a swish part of London.
BUT, and this is key here, Millie isn’t really happy where she is, and she knows in the very marrow of her being that if she doesn’t act on her instincts to give opera singing a go, a proper, boots-and-all go, that she will regret it.
So, one cold dark morning, she sets off from London for a small village in Scotland which comes, naturally enough as all good British romantic comedies demand, with a pub run by an idiosyncratic owner with a heart of gold behind his gruff manner, Ramsay Macfadyen (Gary Lewis) who initially refuses to rent a room to a shocked Millie because it would extra work for him.
Yes, he is, and the village is, with a cast of sweet but wacky characters, are every bit as offbeat as you expect them to be; in this respect Falling For Figaro isn’t exactly an out of the box surprise but then, you don’t really expect it to be.
It’s a classic British rom-com and it embraces what it is with gusto, charm and a huge amount of heart which means that all the attendant tropes and cliches are given life and meaning and a reason for being, making Falling For Figaro far from simply being a cynical box ticking exercise.
Even Lumley in her glorious role as an opera singer who made it big but nowhere near as big as she hoped for or imagined she’d achieve, flies high above her trope-heavy trappings, investing her role with a genuinely affecting amount of vulnerability, care and concern, not that she’d ever let anyone see too much of her softer side.
In just about every respect, Falling For Figaro takes it obvious, we know where it’s going vibe and makes quirkily and movingly merry with it, careful to make sure that it anchors every last moment in the kind of accessible, grounded humanity that makes the best of the rom-com genre, and this film is right up there, so compelling to watch.
We want to believe dreams come true, and so we root for Millie, and Meghan’s fellow student Max (Hugh Skinner), who has been with her for five years and counting while also working at Ramsay’s pub as cook/handyman/waiter, and who are talented and deserve to be where they are.
That’s the key element that makes Falling For Figaro such a joy to watch – at no time, and in no way, does it ever belittle, the two central aspirant characters nor reduce them to delusional fodder for quick, cheap comedic shots.
Rather, it presents both Millie and Max as two people who can make it, assuming they survive Meghan’s strict tutelage (which is far from guaranteed) and who have a real shot at making their dreams come true, which will likely happen by one of them winning the high profile opera singing contest, Singer of Renown.
It’s clear from the get go that one of them will win the contest and that yes, they will fall in love – refreshingly Charlie isn’t presented as a complete emotional idiot which makes Millie’s choice between him and Max a genuinely challenging and heart wrenching one – but that’s okay because with Falling For Figaro it’s all in the adorably lovely execution which always remember that here are real people in play and not simply rom-com cardboard cutouts to be moved about in some sweet Cupidian chess game.
That’s likely what makes Falling For Figaro so endearing.
It has all the expected pieces, and the fairly obvious end point, but it never lets that becomes what steers this delightfully romantic ship, which is as much a love letter to the art of opera as it is about two people pursuing their entirely valid dreams and falling in love.
It’s hardly revolutionary or groundbreaking but then it doesn’t have to be; all it needs to do, and it does it very well indeed, is take all its constituent pieces, aided by wonderfully nuanced, humour-laced performances from of the three main players, and make something truly heartfelt and moving.
And it does, with the light-as-air plot acquiring quite a bit of narrative heft simply because the film treats all the important bits – lost and found dreams, moving up and on and working out who you are and living it – with the seriousness and gravity they deserve.
All of the light and fun stuff around it is simply the romantic icing on the cake, all the more enjoyable because the core of the film is treated as it should be – as two people going for broke to make their dreams come true and discovering lots about themselves and others in the process.
So, while the trailer may seem light and frothy and sweetly beguiling, and it is an accurate reflection of a film with all those highly enjoyable qualities, it has also has real weight and substance to it, with Falling For Figaro celebrating having dreams and following them and let your heart guide you on come what may.
It’s never easy giving up everything for that one big lunge at the brass ring but it is always worth it, no matter where you land, and Falling For Figaro makes a big deal of this, appealingly mixing together froth and bubble, quirk and warmhearted, humour, and real intense emotions that reflect the two sides of the dream-chasing coin to create a film that may not be out of the box experimental but which makes escaping the box you might be a real, possible prospect that you’d be mad not to pursue.