Bill (2015)

Ben Willbond's Philip of Spain is a genius comic creation. It's worth watching the film for him alone but on top of that it's a great film with plenty of classic moments and obscure references stuffed into it. A Python-esque comedy in the silliest English tradition.

A very entertaining, irreverent take on how Shakespeare rose to fame. It's really quite silly but on the same hand quite consistent with its own internal logic. (Unlike say Pan or Prometheus which are both a narrative mess where characters completely flip- flop for no other reason than the writer was too thick or lazy to find another way to progress the plot)King Phillip II of Spain is a joyously dickish main antagonist with some great one liners. Sir Francis Walsingham is just bizarre and Bill himself is charmingly gormless.The film left me with a smile on my face and kinda wishing I got a few more of the Shakespeare references. It also has me randomly blurting out 'King Phillip the Second of Spain' on occasion. Well done Team Horrible Histories!

There are to be peace talks between Queen Elizabeth I and King Phillip of Spain. Elizabeth wants to impress Phillip by presenting a play and the Earl of Croydon (or is it Crawley) foolishly offers his services while drunk. Fortunately, playwright William Shakespeare has just arrived in London to seek his fortune.There is a UK TV series, based on a series of kids' books, called Horrible Histories, and this is the first cinema outing for the repertory team behind that series: as with (for instance) the Monty Python team, most of the parts are played by the same handful of actors, with cameos from Damien Lewis and Helen McCrory.What we have is a "what might have been" story, packed with gags, most of which are a combination of silly and clever and based on anachronism (Shakespeare starts off as a member of a mandolin group called the Mortal Coils, sacked when he plays a modern guitar solo on his mandolin during a madrigal. After awkward goodbyes, one member of the group says "Well, we'll shuffle off then.") The anachronistic humour plays happily against the well realised period look of the piece – locations, costumes and sets all have a pleasingly authentic look to them.Sitting in a (sadly) empty cinema, I giggled throughout this.

The last thing that anyone connected with this project could claim is originality and nor, I would imagine, would anyone do so. The concept of spoof histories can be traced at least as far back as 1066 And All That and, for all I know, even further. We've also had The Complete Plays of Shakespeare in 87 Minutes, and latterly Horrible Histories out of which the current feature, Bill, has evolved and your reaction to it will very much depend on your appreciation and/or tolerance of the genre. I tend to agree with the opinions I've read that this is a one-joke idea attempting to flesh out a Bumper Fun Book and falling short by about ten chapters. The law of averages weighs in with roughly a pennyweight of half-decent gags but then, dear viewer, you're on your own.