Directing: B
Acting: B+
Writing: B-
Cinematography: B
Editing: B+

Slipping back into the world of Downton Abbey is the cinematic equivalent of slipping into a cozy, warm blanket—specifically an old, beloved one you’ve had for years. It’s a bit worn and tired, a lot of threads are coming loose, but the familiarity alone brings a heartening comfort.

This feeling is arguably even more pronounced with Downton Abbey: A New Era than it was with the release of the 2019 original Downton Abbey film, which itself came along three years after the six-season television series aired its last season on PBS. Now, it’s been three years we last saw all these beloved characters on the big screen, and six since we saw them on the small screen. (Granted, the lines between “big screen” and “small screen” are increasingly blurred, both with shorter windows of release between the two, and literal sizes of home TV sets. But, this cast of characters fits comfortably in all combinations.)

Beyond that, I can’t say there’s anything particularly special, or particularly disappointing, about A New Era. It’s made for the fans, and it brings them just what they want. I enjoyed the film precisely as much as I was hoping to. The key difference between the two films, I think, is that the first came a year prior to the start of a pandemic that severely hastened a lot of inevitable changes in the film industry. As such, the 2019 film felt a lot more like an essential moviegoing event, at least for Downton fans, than this one could ever hope to. The official release date is today, but I went to an earliest screening possible, at 7:00 last night, and was one of maybe ten people in the theater. Had the pandemic never happened, this absolutely would not be the case. But, as it is, presumably there are plenty of people very much looking forward to watching this film, but also fine with waiting all of 45 days to see it at home on Peacock 4th of July weekend.

I might have been too, really. I just love going to the movies, and am one of those nerds who despair at the erosion of moviegoing as a tenet of American culture. Marvel blockbusters are singlehandedly saving the theater industry, largely with extraordinarily expensive testaments to mediocrity, but I must begrudgingly appreciate them, at least for now while they keep multiplexes open, and allow for movies like this to play on other screens while the blockbusters make all the money. Still having the monthly membership available through AMC (which other chains now offer too) does make it easier, so I can see Downton Abbey in the theater and not feel like it’s more expensive than it’s worth.

Because this movie is . . . let’s face it: fine. For true fans of the series, it’s good. Not great, but good—something that could be said of every iteration of this property from the start, really. It’s just another <i>Upstairs Downstairs</i> concept effectively designed for addictive watching, a sanitized view of extreme wealth in period costumes (in this case as they shift into the 1930s), conveniently gleaning over the true horrors and oppressions of class and British colonialism while basically ignoring race altogether. (There’s a scene in this film in which a Black woman singer is highlighted at a party. You can practically hear writer Julian Fellowes desperately saying, “Look, I included a Black person!”)

As for the plot, just like the previous film, it feels very much like just another extended episode of the series—albeit one in which some key plot turns occur. I won’t lie, this movie did make me cry a little, but I’m just going to blame that on the relatively recent death of my mother making me soft, or at least softer than I was before. A New Era begins with a wedding (between Tom Branson and Lucy Smith, a woman introduced in the first film who I did not remember), and ends with a death—I won’t spoil whose, except to say that it hardly qualifies as tragic. There are sad turns, but nothing truly horrible happens in Downton Abbey, particularly in the film iterations, which exist solely to trade on fan nostalgia. This is a key difference between the films and the series, which was much more of a soap opera, whereas these films might make you wistful at the very worst.

Ultimately, Downton Abbey is pure fantasy. This is something Fellowes, as directed by Simon Curtis, kicks up a notch in A New Era, what with Lady Grantham (Maggie Smith, even at age 87 arguably the biggest star of this huge-ensemble film) suddenly inheriting a villa in the South of France, from a man with whom she had a weekend fling in her youth. Half the cast goes to this villa for a visit, meeting the bitter widow (Nathalie Baye) and her shockingly agreeable son (Jonathan Zaccaï) who invited them all. In an extraordinary coincidence of timing, at the same time a film crew has asked for permission to shoot a movie (starring actors played by Laura Haddock and Dominic West; West gets involved in a subtle almost-romantic subplot with Robert James-Collier’s Barrow, who is now running the downstairs staff after the butler Carson’s retirement).

There are many subplots, of course, and they all get tied up tidily by the end, as is the formula for Downton, and precisely what all of its fans come for. This movie exists just to keep us all satiated for just a little bit longer, but with that at its mandate, it succeeds on all fronts.

*What’s old is still the same, ironically.*

Overall: B