★★★★☆

It’s a cliché to state that British people love an underdog, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. It’s certainly difficult to think of another country that would count someone like Eddie ‘The Eagle’ Edwards as one of its most famous sporting figures.

Another man very much in the spirit of Eddie – who of course spawned a lovable movie back in 2016 – was Maurice Flitcroft, who earned the title of ‘world’s worst golfer’ when he competed at the British Open in 1976 thanks to some form-filling trickery.

His remarkable story is told in The Phantom of the Open, which unites actor-turned-director Craig Roberts with Paddington 2 co-writer Simon Farnaby. As you’d expect from that duo, the film is charm personified – a heart-warming story of not-quite-triumph against adversity. There’s nothing more British than coming up a long way short, but feeling like a winner anyway.

Mark Rylance plays Flitcroft – a shipyard crane operator from Barrow-in-Furness who is seeking a new direction as the spectre of redundancy looms. He happens upon TV coverage of the British Open and, after a fantasy sequence which combines Videodrome and Superman, decides he’s going to take part in the tournament himself.

Amid snobbery from his local country clubs leaving him without a formal handicap, Maurice decides to simply tick the box as a “professional” golfer and submit his tea-stained application. He’s soon on the fairway, shooting a score of 49 over par – the worst round ever registered at the Open.

At the centre of everything is a delightful performance from Rylance, who operates best when working in a register of mischievous twinkle. Maurice is a fraudster who sees his misdemeanours as entirely victimless and seems mildly baffled at how seriously everybody else takes it. The way he sees it, he’s just a man trying to make the best of his life, oblivious to the concerns of golf’s governing bodies – represented by an enjoyably Scottish Rhys Ifans as Open bigwig Keith Mackenzie – and the corporate sensitivities around his son Mike’s (Jake Davies) management role at the shipyard.

It’s definitely Rylance’s film through and through, with Flitcroft’s gentle humility a perfect fit for his quiet, understated acting style

It’s definitely Rylance’s film through and through, with the gentle humility of Flitcroft a perfect fit for his quiet, understated acting style. His dominance occasionally comes at the detriment of the strong supporting cast. Sally Hawkins is framed too much as a clichéd ‘long-suffering wife’ to Flitcroft, though she does get one elegantly written and beautifully performed monologue in the second half which gives the character much-needed depth.

There’s an enjoyably gentle feel to the movie, with Roberts and Farnaby – adapting the biography of Flitcroft he wrote with Scott Murray – a delightful partnership of director and writer. The movie doesn’t soft-pedal its depiction of a working class family struggling to make ends meet, but focuses on how joy can be found within that context, often via small, simple pleasures.

Flitcroft extols the ‘heaven’ represented by a good cup of tea and elatedly proclaims “I’ll put the heating on” when his family reunites after time apart, as if the mere act of being comfortably warm is a celebratory treat. It’s a film willing to depict financial and familial hardship in Northern England, while never wallowing in kitchen sink misery.

This is helped by a terrific soundtrack of 60s and 70s hits, including Leo Sayer’s You Make Me Feel Like Dancing and Build Me Up Buttercup by The Foundations. It’s a fairly obvious jukebox selection that will make for a hell of a Spotify playlist, but it achieves its goal of permeating the film with a sense of carefree nostalgia. Given the fact that director Roberts wasn’t born until 1991 – with apologies to any readers horrified by that information – it’s impressive that he is able to capture the time period so warmly and effectively on screen.

…a film willing to depict financial and familial hardship in Northern England, while never wallowing in kitchen sink misery

It’s easy to look down on a film like The Phantom of the Open, which trades in cosy charm rather than hard-hitting realities. But that’s very much a reflection of the life Maurice Flitcroft lived – a world in which “love your mistakes and you can’t go wrong” is a mantra to stand by. Like the man himself, the film makes a virtue of simplicity and praises those who are willing to give things a try above those who seem to achieve without ever having to break a sweat.

Roberts and Farnaby don’t tell a sugar-coated story in which those who shoot for the stars and try to live their dreams always win. But what they do say is that it’s always worth giving those dreams a go, because there’s nothing sadder than being left with the prospect of what could have been. Over the course of a lifetime, we probably all end up scoring a few over par, but it’s worth it for the chance at that occasional hole in one.