iPad Round-Up 8 - ALBATROSS

ALBATROSS is a nicely observed British coming-of-age drama by debut director Nial MacCormick and writer Tamzin Rafn.  It stars Felicity Jones (LIKE CRAZY) as Beth, an earnest intellectual teenage girl living in her parents seaside boarding house. Her mother (Julia Ormond) is the put-upon wife of a one-hit wonder author (Sebastian Koch).  Into the mix comes Emelia (DOWNTON's Jessica Brown-Findlay), a teenage tearaway who conducts an affair with the father, and befriends the daughter, leading rather predictably to a confrontation about the implicit betrayal staged over Beth's Oxford entrance interview weekend.  There's nothing massively new here, but I liked the performances, and there was something convincing about both Beth and Emelia - both girls aware that they are sexually attractive but not yet in control of it. I also liked Sebastian Koch as the wastrel father. ALBATROSS isn't a stand-out film by any means, but it is an interesting enough watch, and I look forward to MacCormick's next feature. 

ALBATROSS opened in the UK and Ireland in 2011 and is available to rent and own.

London Film Fest 2011 Day 4 - LIKE CRAZY

God I hated this movie. I hated it from the opening scene where kookily sweet English girl Anna (Felicity Jones) propositions  goofy, nerdy American boy Jacob (Anton Yelchin) with a quirkily, goofily, cutesy letter under his windscreen-wiper.  I hated the falling in love scenes - all reading each other's poetry and carving each other's names on a chair - adolescent crappiness - and the self-indulgent, stupid manner in which the girl screws up her visa application by over-staying her welcome.  I had no sympathy for the couple. She just seemed selfish and juvenile - he just seemed weedy and pathetic.  Her parents seemed unbelievably nice - why didn't they just slap them both round the face and tell them to get on with it?  And as for so-called honest insights about the problems with long-distance relationships - jealousy, cheating, feeling left out, expense - frankly, there's nothing more profound in this flick than in the mainstream rom-com GOING THE DISTANCE.  

Just because you film everything in a ramshackle indie style; give it a score by Dustin O'Halloran; and neither of the lead characters ever wash or comb their hair, doesn't make a movie authentic or interesting.  I really just don't get the hype it's receiving.  It struck me as juvenile, self-indulgent and banal - just like its milquetoast lead characters.  ENOUGH ALREADY!  

LIKE CRAZY played Sundance 2011 where it won the Grand Jury Prize - Dramatic beating TERRI, MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE and HERE. Felicity Jones won the Special Jury Prize for Acting.  The version shown at London 2011 has been cut to achieve a PG-13 rating.  LIKE CRAZY will be released in the US on October 28th and in the UK on February 3rd.

Felicity Jones on the red carpet for the UK premiere
of LIKE CRAZY at the BFI London Film Festival

DVD Review - CEMETERY JUNCTION

CEMETERY JUNCTION is a really lovely heart-warming coming-of-age drama set in 1970s provincial England. It tells the story of three school-friends on the cusp of adulthood, when you're still trying to figure out how to talk to the opposite sex, which sort of a job you want to do, and basically what sort of a life you want to lead. The engine of the plot is that one of the friends, ambitious Freddie (Christian Cooke) gets a white-collar job as an insurance salesman. This sparks off two different problems, reflecting the social upheaval that was going on in the UK at the time. First, by trying to move away from blue collar work, Freddie alienates his father and his friends, who think he is implying that he thinks he's better than them. Second, through his job, Freddie comes across an old flame, Julia, who happens to be the boss' daughter. Julia's life has already been mapped out for her by her dad, Mr Kendrick (Ralph Fiennes). In encouraging her to get engaged to his similarly chauvinistic side-kick, Mike (Matthew Goode), he's condemning her to the same life her mother (Emily Watson) has - invisible mother and helper. Freddie wants Julia to leave Mike not just to because he wants her for himself, but because he wants her to have the life and career that she really wants.

The resulting relationship drama is sensitively handled, often laugh-out-loud funny, but ultimately far more concerned to hit the right emotional notes. I really bought into the idea that Freddie, Bruce and Snook were old friends - the banter and body language was spot on. I also really loved Ralph Fiennes and Matthew Goode as the older and younger versions of the male chauvinism. But the actress who really impressed me was Emily Watson - who is able to make herself appear so small and oppressed despite her star power - and with the slightest change in expression and a relatively small amount of screen-time, communicate so much.

Most of all, it's exciting to see Gervais and Merchant in their first co-directed feature film. CEMETERY JUNCTION has some of the finely judged social comedy of THE OFFICE, but it's a much warmer, gentler and optimistic film that THE OFFICE was ever allowed to be - and certainly less self-consciously clever and grim than THE INVENTION OF LYING. I think it's encouraging that two people who have become famous for a very particular brand of observational humour feel able to tackle something quite different. That they are able to bring it off is highly impressive.

Additional tags: Stephen Merchant, Tom Hughes, Christian Cooke, Jack Doolan, Julia Davis, Tim Atack, Valerio Bonelli

CEMETARY JUNCTION was released in the UK in April 2010 and was released on DVD and Blu-Ray today.