The Phantom of the Open: Mark Rylance Elevates a Real-Life Duffer's Impossible Dream
By Jim Slotek
Rating: B
It seems counterintuitive that a British society that has held to a stay-in-your-lane class system for centuries should embrace tales of yobs who dare to dream.
But there are DNA strands from The Commitments, The Full Monty and Eddie the Eagle in the sweet, feel-good film The Phantom of the Open.
Mark Rylance as British Open-crasher Maurice Filtcroft in The Phantom of the Open
Phantom is the true tale of Maurice Flitcroft (Mark Rylance), a fortysomething, soon-to-be-sacked shipyard worker who took up golf in 1975 and blithely lied his way into the British Open a year later.
The result was a 49-over-par 121 score – the highest score in British Open history. (Apparently a more trusting time, Flitcroft discovered professional golfers could sign up without revealing their handicap and so he checked the “Professional” box on the application).
The suddenly banned Flitcroft became something of a folk hero. Like neophyte ski jumper and Olympian Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards, who was applauded for simply for landing on his feet, Flitcroft would be cheered for finally making a three-putt from 10 feet from the pin.
The “Phantom” part comes from the fact that Flitcroft continued to sneak his way into the Open in subsequent years, posing as a Frenchman, a golfer from the U.S. South and various other aliases (including Arnold Palmtree).
How do you play someone so driven to do something so absurd? That’s where the talented Rylance comes in, a character actor who never fails to elevate whatever level of material he’s given. His Flitcroft is a man who had dreams, but had humbly set them aside to be a husband (Sally Hawkins similarly elevates the thin-on-paper role of Jean) and father - his twin boys (Jonah and Christian Lees) are also improbable dreamers, dedicated to a career as disco dancers, while his older step-son (Jake Davies) is a by-the-book engineer who’s horrified at how his dad’s attention-getting will affect his corporate career.
Flitcroft’s epiphany, when he sees Tom Watson win a golf tournament on TV, is quiet but palpably wide-eyed. Director Craig Roberts subsequently gilds the lily a bit with a dream-scene (one of the only such flourishes in the movie) where Flitcroft flies, orbiting the Earth, which turns into a giant golf-ball.
Historically, in a movie like this where a central character goes middle-aged crazy, the spouse is there to insist they snap out of it. Hawkins’ Jean is the opposite, aware of the sacrifices her husband has made, and enthusiastically becoming his co-conspirator, advising him and typing letters of protest against the powers that be.
The odd golfball-centric bit of whimsy aside, The Phantom of the Open is straight-ahead storytelling (complete with a pat family crisis that is neatly resolved) that can only be as good as the actors in it. To his credit, Rylance offers us a Flitcroft he respects, with quiet resolve and an apparent ability to ignore the noise of naysayers as he follows his strange dream.
It’s a winning performance in a warm-hearted tale.
The Phantom of the Open. Directed by Craig Roberts. Starring Mark Rylance, Sally Hawkins, Jonah and Christian Lees, Jake Davies. Opens Friday, June 17 in Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Vancouver.