Movie Review: BANK OF DAVE

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer

Posted: August 25th, 2023 / 08:36 AM

BANK OF DAVE movie poster | ©2023 Samuel Goldwyn Co.

Rating: PG-13
Stars: Joel Fry, Phoebe Dynevor, Jo Hartley, Rory Kinnear, Naomi Battrick, Paul Kaye Adrian Lukis, Harry Mitchell, Cathy Tyson, Angus Wright
Writer: Piers Ashworth
Director: Chris Foggin
Distributor: Samuel Goldwyn Co.
Release Date: August 25, 2023

Lots of fact-based films invent characters and storylines to make themselves more dramatic and interesting. Without knowing the ins and outs of what really happened, it’s impossible to say for certain what the case is with BANK OF DAVE. However, we get the feeling that the truth may be more intriguing than the fiction here.

David “Dave” Fishwick, played here by Rory Kinnear, is a real person – and one of this film’s executive producers – and there really is a “Bank of Dave.” There was a 2012 documentary about the man and the establishment on the UK’s Channel 4.

BANK OF DAVE opens with Dave enthusiastically singing a karaoke rendition of Whitesnake’s “Here I Go Again” at his local pub. He then accepts repayment of a loan, with unasked-for interest, from a pal who is opening a new shopping center. As Dave often provides loans to friends, the pal suggests that Dave open an actual bank that helps ordinary people who don’t qualify for regular banking services.

We’re in the northern England town of Burnley, where Dave is headquartered. We shortly learn that Dave has a franchise of minibus dealerships (he used to sell vans), and has built up wealth that he likes to give back to the community.

Then we’re in London, where we meet Hugh (Joel Fry), the lawyer assigned to help Dave make his application to the U.K.’s Financial Regulation Board. Hugh isn’t too optimistic. Leaving aside Dave’s non-banking background, the Board hasn’t approved a new bank in a hundred and fifty years.

The screenplay by Piers Ashworth has its heart in the right place. At the same time Dave is trying to get his bank going, his doctor niece Alexandra (Phoebe Dynevor) is attempting to open a free walk-in clinic. There is a lot of discussion of the class system, which is run by people who don’t want their own power and prestige diluted. In broad strokes, this all is very civic-minded.

But the dialogue is so often on the nose that it’s hard to entirely sink into BANK OF DAVE’s world. Also, there seems to be a desire to check “audience appeal” boxes. So, about half the film is devoted not to Dave and his quest, but to Hugh’s slow but sure conversion from skeptic to true believer about both the cause and Burnley itself. There’s also a love story that’s not unpleasant, but seems to be here simply because someone felt it was required.

Fry is natural, Dynevor is charming, and Kinnear is positively heroic in making everything sound like something a person would normally say. Jo Hartley is warm as Dave’s wife Nicola, Paul Kaye is fun as a retired rock promoter, Hugh Bonneville makes for a suitable representative of the establishment, and Angus Wright is enjoyable as Hugh’s boss.

Director Chris Foggin knows how to create attractive images. He seems most at home in terms of pacing and suspense in the courtroom sequences, where the constraints on what can be said and done create pleasing nuance.

BANK OF DAVE is agreeable and piques our curiosity. It’s just that, given the unique nature of its events, it seems like it ought to be less conventional.

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