Film Review: Nativity! (U) *****

Nov 27 2009 by Graham Young, Birmingham Mail

THERE’S still a month to go before December 25, but Birmingham-born director Debbie Isitt has delivered an unmissable pre-Christmas family treat with Nativity!

And, in the now seven-year-old Cannock youngster Ben Wilby, possibly found a real star of the future.

Every parent who has had children go through primary school will be familiar with the Nativity play – not least the sheer amount of hard work required no matter how good the end result.

Nativity! sums up the whole enterprise brilliantly, with lots of humour and some vibrant original songs, too.

Now based in Coventry, Isitt has directed this 106-minute film from her own improvised script.

Husband Nicky Ager helped her to co-write the original music and, incredibly, edited down their 140 hours worth of footage at home – just like he did with their previous film, Confetti.

Martin Freeman (The Office/Hot Fuzz) plays under-achieving teacher Mr (Paul) Maddens who hates Christmas because he was once dumped under the mistletoe by his then girlfriend, Jennifer (Ashley Jensen).

Jason Watkins is Gordon Shakespeare, a teacher at a local private school who wants to impress the Coventry Telegraph’s over-the-top drama critic (Alan Carr).

St Bernadettes’ headteacher Mrs Bevan (Pam Ferris) decides she wants to retire in a blaze of glory and brings in an assistant called Mr Poppy (Marc Wootton) to help Mr Maddens.

But can the pair even get on together long enough to organise a show when Mr Poppy wears lumberjack shirts and seems to have a parker jacket complete with its own wings?