‘Downton Abbey: A New Era’ feels overstuffed but has enough happy endings to satisfy its devoted fans

Downton Abbey: A New Era

Starring Hugh Bonneville, Elizabeth McGovern, Michelle Dockery, Maggie Smith, Allen Leech, Jim Carter, Robert James-Collier, Imelda Staunton, Hugh Dancy, Dominic West, Laura Haddock. Written by Julian Fellowes. Directed by Simon Curtis. At GTA theatres May 20, with evening screenings May 19. 124 minutes. G

Watching “Downton Abbey: A New Era” feels very much like the end of an era.

I’m not going to spoil plot details, but so many loose ends are tied up in this, the second film spawned by the beloved TV show, it’s hard to imagine where a third film could take the saga of the aristocratic Crawley family and their servants.

The “Downton” franchise has been a juggernaut since the six-season TV series created by Julian Fellowes debuted in 2010. Fans still flock to Highclere Castle in the Hampshire countryside, where “Downton” was partially filmed; and “Downton Abbey: The Exhibition,” currently on hiatus, has been touring the U.S. since 2018.

But as a fan, I’d be fine with leaving Lord and Lady Grantham and the rest where they end up in “A New Era.”

As the movie opens, it’s 1929. All the key characters have gathered for the wedding of Tom Branson (Allen Leech), the family’s former chauffeur and widower of Lady Sybil Crawley, and Lucy Smith (Tuppence Middleton), illegitimate daughter of a lady in waiting to the queen of England.

That won’t be a shock to anyone who saw the 2019 film, called simply “Downton Abbey,” since it ended with Tom and Lucy kindling a romance.

That film also ended with fan favourite Violet Crawley, the dowager countess of Grantham (Maggie Smith), telling granddaughter Mary (Michelle Dockery) she wasn’t long for this world. But don’t worry, Violet is still around in “A New Era” to provide comic relief with her tart quips, albeit in a reduced physical state.

Violet is at the centre of the movie’s inciting incident, which brings a whiff of scandal: when she was a young bride, she spent a few days with a French marquis at his villa in the South of France. He registered the villa in her name — Violet claims not to know why — and now she has inherited it against his widow’s wishes. Violet has in turn transferred ownership to Sybbie, daughter of Tom and Sybil, since she’s the only one of the Crawley sisters’ offspring not in line to inherit an estate.

Thus most of the family — Tom and Lucy, the Earl and Countess of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville and Elizabeth McGovern), Lady Edith (Laura Carmichael) and husband Bertie, the Marquess of Hexham (Harry Hadden-Patton), and Maud (Imelda Staunton), the earl’s cousin and Lucy’s mother — decamps to France with a few servants in tow, at the invitation of the late marquis’s son (Jonathan Zaccaï).

Violet is too frail to travel and Lady Mary stays behind because somebody has to supervise the crew making a silent movie at Downton (yes, it’s rather meta). According to former butler Carson (Jim Carter), letting actors have the run of the estate “smacks of the worst excesses of the French Revolution,” but the roof is leaking and the film company is cutting a very large cheque.

And so some new blood is added to the mix: Hugh Dancy as the film’s director; Dominic West, soon to join Staunton playing a royal in “The Crown,” as the leading man and Laura Haddock as the leading lady.

This plot thread has echoes of the 1952 movie musical “Singin’ in the Rain.” Here, as in that flick, talking pictures are overtaking silent films, threatening the careers of actors like Haddock’s Myrna, with her decidedly non-posh accent.

But really, the point of it all is to allow the “Downton” characters to do what fans have come to expect, so Carson blusters; assistant cook Daisy (Sophie McShera) marvels at having movie stars in the house; awkward Mr. Molesley (Kevin Doyle) blunders into a scene and ruins a take; Violet and her frenemy Isobel (Penelope Wilton) crack wise in the wings; and Lady Mary keeps everything together in a well-mannered, slightly haughty way.

Without eight or nine episodes to spread the action around, and every character from the earl down to the new footman getting at least some dialogue, we don’t so much dig into the story as glance off it, and characters are not so much developed as sketched. (Lily James’ Lady Rose isn’t in this film and Mary’s husband Henry, played by Matthew Goode, is also MIA.)

All that being said, there is catharsis to be had for long-time “Downton” devotees — and, really, if you aren’t already invested why would you see this movie? This is fan service, pure and simple, and Fellowes lards the film with happy endings all around — except for one development likely to bring a tear to your eye.

There is a passing of the torch, and a sense of emotional bonds acknowledged and strengthened, both for the Crawleys and their help.

“Individual Crawleys come and go, but the family lives on,” says Cora, Lady Grantham.

Indeed it does, perhaps not onscreen in future instalments, but certainly in the hearts and imaginations of those who have long cherished these characters.

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