For a wide swathe of British filmgoers, it’s a general truth that if you parrot the line “We’ve gone on holiday by mistake” or “We want the finest wines available to humanity,” they’ll immediately know which film you’re referring to. To a lesser extent, “I feel like a pig shat in my head” is a staple of Freshers’ Week hangovers, where someone, particularly in the 2000s, was likely to have dug out the DVD and insisted you watch it if you hadn’t seen it already, telling you in that wide-eyed exuberant fashion reserved for film stans that it’s the best film they’ve ever seen, and bound to be your new favourite.

The film in question is Withnail & I, from writer-director Bruce Robinson starring an early-career Richard E. Grant and future Time Lord Paul McGann. Set in 1969, the film depicts the toxic bromance between Withnail and Marwood, two substance-abusing unemployed actors sharing a cesspit of a flat in Camden. Seeking a respite from their chaotic urban existence, they decide to take a holiday (by mistake) to the countryside, only to find their new surroundings even more dilapidated before Withnail’s eccentric Uncle Monty turns up to add more chaos to it all.

Initially released to middling fanfare and box office, the film spent much of the 90s steadily cementing a cult status. Gaining word-of-mouth acclaim as students passed VHS copies around university halls, it gradually entered the pop culture vernacular as the ardently important – and hilarious – piece of cinema it is. Its impact persists to this day, routinely voted by critics to be amongst the greatest British films of all time, with filmmakers as varied as Shane Black, Alexander Payne and Mark Duplass citing it as an influence. The Prince Charles Cinema in Leicester Square hosts regular quote-alongs, not one but two bars in Brighton derive their name from its characters (Presuming Ed’s and the now-defunct Marwood Café), and Richard E. Grant’s quotes have become particularly meme-worthy in the internet age. (During the lockdown, “I think we’ve been in here too long, I feel unusual” took on a whole new meaning.) Something about the characters’ self-confessed haphazardness lends the quotes particularly well to self-aggrandising millennial meme culture. “I’m thirty in a month and I’ve got a sole flapping off my shoe.” #HardRelate. It me.

In recent weeks, a 4K restoration has been released. Given its lesions of fans and pop culture significance, it’s easy to see why. The Garden Cinema in London held a screening of this new rendering, complete with complimentary whiskey, which seems fitting. Among the many traditions the film has engendered, a drinking game is naturally included, much to the filmmakers’ chagrin since the film never frames the alcoholic tendencies of its protagonists in a positive light. The rules of most Withnail & I drinking games require the audience to knock back everything the characters drink, from nine and a half (count them) glasses of red wine to lighter fluid – with vinegar or overproof rum provided as common substitutes. (“The finest wines in all humanity” are not part of the game, since Withnail and Marwood are ejected from the pub before they have the chance to consume them.)

Like many films whose reputation precedes them, it’s a challenge to view it completely unencumbered. Even for first-time viewers of Withnail & I, so much of this film has attained iconic status that it’s impossible to view it without its notoriety, like Brando’s daughter’s wedding speech in The Godfather or American Beauty’s plastic bag. That said, re-watching Withnail & I at The Garden Cinema in 4K was hugely enjoyable. The script still packs a punch, its one-liners delivered with foppish brilliance by the two leads. The way Richard E. Grant in particular coils himself around this character, imbuing lines like “Rejuvenate? I’m in a park and I’m practically dead” with Shakespearean vigour is second to none. It feels like the part he was born to play – like all great comic characters, it seems like a version of himself turned up several notches, void of self-awareness. Richard Griffiths is dependably good as Uncle Monty, and the memorable set pieces that punctuate the film – the chicken scene, the fight in the tearoom, the bull encounter – keep things moving along at pace.

For the most part, the movie stands the test of time, though viewing it through a 2020s prism will always bring up some questionable ethics. Griffiths’ Uncle Monty – though played dynamically by a stalwart actor of the age – feels like an unfair, derisory depiction of a gay man, and perhaps not what the filmmakers intended. Monty is a comedic device, a flamboyant figure of ridicule used to out-Withnail Withnail. He is to be laughed at. It’s hard not to watch and feel pity for Monty as someone sad and pathetic, a lonely victim of the prejudices of his era. His unwelcome advances on Marwood are meant to be the film’s comic climax – but something about it makes for horribly uncomfortable viewing in 2024, particularly his insistence as he races to the door to prevent Marwood leaving – “I mean to have you, even if it must be burglary!” The idea of gay-man-as-predator seeking to have his way with any available straight man regardless of consent feels like a jarring throwback from a 1980s mentality. We have, thankfully, moved on.

These scenes aside, the film works. On viewing it this time (possibly my ninth), I was more struck than ever by its sorrowful lament for the end of the 60s. Set in 1969, the excitement of the flower power movement has narrowed to a pitiful close – as the character Denny, a laid-back, sunglasses-donning drug dealer who epitomises the time period, points out, “The greatest decade in the history of mankind is nearly over. They’re selling hippie wigs in Woolworths.” It’s the death knell sounding on a time period that was meant to change everything, having dwindled to an end and become a parody of itself, a Halloween costume. For a film made in 1987 looking back on this era, there’s a melancholy nature to it I didn’t notice quite so starkly on the first viewing. Is Withnail & I, made at the tail end of the Thatcher era, a re-examination of the 60s through a post-Thatcherite lens? Its creators wondering whatever happened to the rebellious spirit of the decade, replaced by a thawing out process across the 70s, its death cemented by the 1980s’ devotion to conservative politics and corporate greed?

As a piece of cinema exploring the significant decade the 60s was, and for its tack-sharp dialogue and performances, it remains a masterpiece. There’s no questioning why it’s habitually cited as the best British film ever. See it now, for the first time or the fiftieth!

Withnail & I is out now on 4K UHD from Arrow Video: arrowfilms.com/withnail-and-i-4k