Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man (15, 112 mins)

Rating:

Verdict: A genuinely terrific finale to 36 hours of telly

Birmingham transformed into a scene straight out of a period drama on Monday evening. Hundreds of costumed enthusiasts, sporting the signature flat caps and flapper attire, gathered at the city’s Symphony Hall for the world premiere of “Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man.”

If I had my own cap, I would have tipped it to Tom Harper’s electrifying film. Crafting a successful movie adaptation of a beloved TV series is no small feat. While “The Sopranos” and “Breaking Bad” films fell short of expectations, and let’s not even mention “Holiday On the Buses,” Harper’s work truly stands out.

Steven Knight, the mastermind behind “Peaky Blinders,” has outdone himself with this captivating, adrenaline-charged narrative set during World War Two. His latest work embodies a level of excellence that is nothing short of remarkable.

Whether you’re a newcomer or a longtime fan of the series, this film stands on its own merits. However, for those familiar with the TV drama, there’s an added layer of depth in seeing the journey of Tommy Shelby (played by Cillian Murphy). Now grappling with his tumultuous past and war memories, Shelby retreats to his dilapidated country house, attempting to pen his memoirs.

Tommy always was brighter, and more soulful, than the average psycho.

It’s not easy to make a big-screen spin-off that lives up to the expectations set by a hit television series but Peaky Blinders : The Immortal Man acieves it

Back in Brum, meanwhile, his estranged, amoral son Duke (Barry Keoghan) is running the Peaky Blinders gang. In a pleasing echo of the opening episode of the TV show, he oversees the theft of a munitions cache following the Luftwaffe’s bombing of a small arms factory (which really happened in Birmingham, in November 1940, and the film is dedicated to the memory of the 53 workers who were killed).

It’s not rifles that fire this story, though, but readies. Tim Roth gives one of his classic slimeball performances as Beckett, a spy working for the Nazis, whose brief from Berlin is to flood Britain with hundreds of millions of pounds in counterfeit banknotes, wrecking the economy. Beckett needs the collusion of criminals to do so, and with Tommy retired from the devilment business, he approaches Duke.

Tommy only steps in after a visit from the twin sister (Rebecca Ferguson) of one of his past loves, Duke’s mother. Like him she’s of Romany Gypsy stock, and a soothsayer, who gives him a hint of what his boy is up to back in the city. 

Tommy knows he was a bad parent – ‘I was never a father, I was a form of government’ – but maybe it’s not too late for redemption. 

At any rate, there’s soon a confrontation between father and son that might yield the best pigsty sequence you will ever see in the cinema … oddly enough there are quite a few to choose from.

By now, Beckett has set Duke a forbidding test of loyalty to him and his dastardly scheme, involving Tommy’s sister Ada (Sophie Rundle). His reward will be a significant chunk of the forged fivers, followed by favoured status after Hitler wins the war. 

So, can Duke get his hands on a moral compass in time? And can Tommy overcome the inner torment caused not just by PTSD but all his misdeeds, to leave some kind of positive legacy?

It works perfectly as a standalone film whether or not you watched the long-running TV drama. But if you did, you will appreciate the evolution of Tommy Shelby ( Cillian Murphy )

Tommy recruits the de facto king of the Mersey docklands (played, in what might be the least surprising casting decision of all time, by Stephen Graham)

These questions are eventually resolved not in Birmingham but Liverpool, where the fake Nazi moolah is being smuggled in through the docks. To help him, Tommy recruits the de facto king of the Mersey docklands (played, in what might be the least surprising casting decision of all time, by Stephen Graham). 

Anyway, it all ends explosively in more ways than one, with quite the best use of canalboats since Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl (2024).

There is talk of more series of Peaky Blinders, but this film still works as a genuinely terrific finale to 36 hours of telly. Murphy is as compelling as ever, and he is matched by his fellow Irishman, Keoghan, even if the Brummie vowels go missing from time to time.

Knight’s script sparkles too, and there are some wonderful flourishes by him, or maybe by the director, Tom Harper (whose impressive list of credits includes not only episodes of Peaky Blinders but also the glorious 2015 TV adaptation of War and Peace and the 2018 film Wild Rose).

Poignant shots of a red scarf that once belonged to Tommy’s dead daughter Ruby, deliberately striking in a palette of browns and greys, even evoke Schindler’s List (1993). And while it’s true that such a comparison might elevate The Immortal Man into company it doesn’t quite deserve, it is still a tremendously enjoyable and satisfying film.

Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man opens in cinemas today, and on Netflix on March 20.