The Nan Movie

The Nan Movie is a 2022 British comedy film written by Catherine Tate and Brett Goldstein and directed by Josie Rourke (uncredited).

The film centres on the eponymous Nan character who travels cross-country to visit her dying sister, and includes several flashbacks to their upbringing and early adulthood.

Foul-mouthed and cantankerous London woman Joanie "Nan" Taylor's (Catherine Tate) is living her best life and her grandson, Jamie (Mathew Horne) now has a YouTube channel making short films.

One night in a club Joanie and Nell meet an American soldier called Walter (Parker Sawyers) and they are both immediately smitten with him.

Back on the road trip Jamie deliberately misses the turn-off to Coventry and ends up in Liverpool, where they are greeted by Officer Mahler (Niky Wardley) who used to work at the council before Nan caused her to be fired.

Realising they are in a lot of trouble, Jamie tries to think what to do, but Nan telephones her Australian friends, who help them disguise the van and themselves.

Inside, Nan is reluctant to see Walter, but discovers he dresses in women's clothes, which she finds hilarious because she thought they had the perfect life.

The project, directed by Josie Rourke of the 2018 biographical drama, Mary Queen of Scots, announced via Instagram that the film would be titled This Nan's Life.

[2][3] Matthew Horne reprises his role as "Nan"'s long-suffering grandson, Jamie, as well as Niky Wardley, another well-known performer within the original series, and Katherine Parkinson.

Those scenes were scaled back and new footage, greatly expanding the modern-day road trip sections, was filmed without Rourke at a low-cost, with animation sequences also used to fill any gaps.

Bleeding Cool commented on the film's disjointed narrative,[18] with the flashback scenes described as "a thoughtful, beautifully shot period piece set in London during the war", while the much more dominant present-day plot is a "dull-looking road trip from London to Ireland filled with boring, tedious irrelevant distractions that hurt the brain."

The site's original review of The Nan Movie was entitled "Finding A Much Better Film Within",[19] and commented on how no director is credited despite collaboration from Josie Rourke, who has previously directed historical dramas and stage plays.

They requested that it be heavily cut to accommodate much more of the present-day plot with the elderly Joan Taylor, whom fans of The Catherine Tate Show will recognise.