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At the end of a stressful day spent chaperoning her son to his Cambridge
University entrance interview, Maureen Lipman's Shani expresses her fear for the
future: "It's Eskimos, in't it, that, when they get old and no use to no-one no
more, they just quietly sling their hooks and toddle off into the snow. For
good. And their kids don't much bother because they're all too busy catching
fish in holes and hoovering their igloos. And life goes on. Theirs does. Not the
poor old useless bugger lying in the snow. Theirs doesn't." Writer Jack Rosenthal, with
characteristic flair, puts into the mouth of his actress wife the feelings of
parental redundancy that he suffered after just such a trip to Cambridge with
their son Adam. Not for the first time, Rosenthal was able to transform an
episode from his own life into a gem of comic observation and genuine
pathos.
Eskimo Day is a tightly woven ensemble piece observing a diverse range of
parent-child groupings on a single day of Cambridge interviews. As ever,
Rosenthal's primary sympathies lie with the Northern working-class family, and
Lipman grabs her role of superstitious matriarch with gusto. Anna Carteret and
Tom Wilkinson portray middle-class parents whose marriage is less than secure
and undermined by Wilkinson's dishonesty. When the offspring of these two
couples meet outside the office of their interviewer (James Fleet), class
differences and parental loyalties fade away, and the prospect of a new
relationship suddenly seems more important than getting into Cambridge. If
Rosenthal is guarded in his support for the Cambridge institution, he is clear
in his affection for these principled young people, as yet unafflicted by their
parents' foibles.
An astute touch is the storyline involving the interviewer visiting a
prospective care home for his elderly father, played by Alec Guinness. At the
other end of the age spectrum, the burden of care has switched, yet the incident
proves a watershed for the son in recognising his father's dignity and
independence. This strand of the film is particularly poignant, featuring as it
does Guinness's last screen appearance.
Piers Haggard also directed a sequel, Cold Enough for Snow
(tx. 31/12/1997), in which Shani's husband Bevis (David Ross) comes close to a
nervous breakdown when, as Lipman put it, the Empty Nest becomes a chasm
- another case of Rosenthal's art echoing life.
Fintan McDonagh
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1. The agony of waiting (2:52)
