JUDAS KISS

Only a gay sci-fi movie would feature a plot line where the protagonist has sex with himself!  It’s just one of the hard-to-fathom threads of this well-meaning movie that is all about the whole concept of having a second chance to go back and fix one’s own past.

Zachary is a failed film director who’s rather aimless life is now nothing more than just a series of parties. He reluctantly agrees to fill in as judge at a film completion at his old alma mater.  As bitter and angry as he is, he still manages to pick up the cutest boy on campus that night and they have a wild night of passion together.  Next day he discovers that the same boy is not only a candidate in the completion but his name is Danny Reyes and the movie he has made is called Judas Kiss. This so happens is Zachary’s legal name and the movie that he directed some 20 years previously in school was also called Judas Kiss.  Turns out the boy is literally him, and what is on offer is Zachary’s chance to make this all turn out better than what they actually did when he had messed it all up.

Nice idea, but JP Tepnapa the young filmmaker hasn't quite worked out all the logics of realistically making the ‘fantasy’ convincing, and sadly too all the characters are just a tad too bland.  It seems like every time the plot is in real danger of going to far off the rails, then the characters kiss. Sweet, but not an effective storytelling technique.

That said there is something that refreshing and engaging that still makes this movie fairly watchable when you can ignore the sci-fi aspects.  Having a cast that are both talented actors and great eye candy helps too.  The actor/writer Charlie David ('Mulligans','A Four Letter Word' etc)  plays Zachary, young Richard Harmon (TV's 'The Killing') is a revelation as Danny, and then there is Sean Paul Lockhart as fellow student Chris.  Turns out that young Mr Lockhart is already a big 'movie' star under the name Brent Corrigan, and now he proves he can act with his clothes on too.

★★★★★★

CRAZY EYES

There is the usual legal disclaimer at the beginning of this movie but with the tag line ‘in reality, every bit of this happened just like you are about to see it’.  It’s difficult to keep that in mind when for the next 90 minutes you are exposed to the meaningless life of a wealthy alcoholic hipster and the woman he drinks with.  One can only hope that for his own sake that filmmaker Adam Sherman’s life cannot really be as bizarrely pointless as this.

So the plot of this sort-of-love story is how Zach a divorced playboy spends the bulk of his day working through the girls listed in his cellphone until one of them agrees to go for a drink with him.  More often or not its Rebecca and she goes along with the pretext that Zach is finally taking her to the Hieronymus Bosch Exhibition as he always promises, but she knows they will end up at a bar drinking.  Its usually the same one where Zach’s only friend Dan tends bar and so keeps his drink topped up.  When Rebecca’s actual boyfriend comes looking to teach Zach a lesson, its Dan who fights him whilst Zach just sneaks behind the bar and pours himself another drink.

Rebecca sleeps with Zach but she doesn't actually put out.  When challenged on this point the movie gives us its one good line with ‘Even Jesus drank wine and spent time with a hooker that he never has sex with’.

Zach’s other non-relationships are just as fuzzy.  His over-protective parents fail to see the wasted drunk their son and heir has become, and in turn he makes a lousy job trying to be part-time father to his only son.  His cheating ex-wife tends to be just fond of Zach’s wallet when she is in between boyfriends.  And gold digger persistent phoner Autumn is just after his money period.

It’s really tough being rational about a movie when the protagonist is so thoroughly unlikable and he leads such a senseless life. Zach is after all, an uninteresting selfish alcoholic nacissitic womanizer total devoid of any joy or any morals. 

I like to find some redeeming value in this movie, and all I can think of is that maybe it would be a perfect one to watch if the rain outside means you may miss you regular AA meeting.   If you can sit through it to the end, this will surely sober you up.


★

THE GREEN

The Green that the title refers to is a small Connecticut affluent seaside town where partners Michael and Daniel have escaped too from New York for a different pace of life.  Wannabe novelist Michael is a high school Drama teacher, and Daniel has started his own restaurant and they are laying down roots refurbishing an old house together.  They have a very small circle of friends, but apart from Daniel’s employee, they strangely seem to be ‘the only gays in the village’.

Michael’s concern for one of his put-upon pupils is soon misconstrued and before too long he is accused by the boy’s stepfather of improper conduct and is arrested by the police and suspended by the school.  The gossip mill works fast in this backwater suburb and within 24 hours both Michael and Daniel are shunned by the entire community.  Except for Daniel’s best friend Trish, who has her own issues as she is dealing with a newly diagnosed cancer, but then Daniel misconstrues her support as latent homophobia and dumps her, and suddenly he’s facing this alone with just a small town litigation lawyer who is way out of his depth.

The lawyer refers him to another attorney in the next town who is better qualified to help Michael fight the false accusations.  She is a lesbian (suddenly the presence of her and her partner doubles the local gay community) and she is good at making Michael deal with the reality of the situation. That also includes a previous police conviction for gross indecency that he had kept quiet from everyone including Daniel, which becomes the final straw for him, and he moves out.

There is a tad too much high-handed melodrama in this wee feature film, which despite all its good intentions just resembles an old-fashioned soap opera.  Not surprising given that this is the debut narrative movie from veteran TV director Steven Williford who cut his teeth on ‘All My Children’ and ‘As The World Turns’.   He has a sterling cast that do their best with an inadequate script that include Jason Butler Harmer, Julia Ormand, Karen Young and Illeana Douglas.  And Cheyenne Jackson as Daniel does an awfully good job of being the handsome partner!

The redeeming factor for me was the unexpected finale that broke with tradition to prove that a happy ending is never guaranteed even when you win. It was the payoff for sitting all the way through this pleasant wee film that sadly never fulfilled its potential.

★★★★★★

BALLROOM RULES

I’ve been dancing my socks off this month cinematically speaking.  First the subliminal PINA (and I am still doing the '4 Seasons' dance in my head), then DANCEMAKER the documentary on one of the world’s greats contemporary choreographers PAUL TAYLOR.  Followed a frenetic look at the manic craziness of kiddies competing in the World Irish Dancing Championships in JIG, and now I have capped it all with a deliciously hilarious look at same-sex couples in Australia as they practice to enter the ballroom dancing competition at the Gay Games in BALLROOM RULES.

All the work has been unquestionably enchanting and totally riveting, and completely unique and there is no connecting factor at all apart from one way or another they have been about people cutting a rug in some shape or form (although I’m not sure Frau Bausch would quite see it in those terms!)  And the most outstanding element about this latest movie compared to the others, is that these Australians were the very worst dancers ever BUT they were also the ones that enjoyed it the most.

The story starts in the autumn of 2009 and just nine months away from the World Gay Games in Germany, and Anny a vivacious blond dance instructor in Melbourne decides to cobble together a team to represent Australia in the Ballroom Dancing Competitions.  Her wee gang of lesbians and gay men are an odd assorted looking bunch and have very little experience on twirling around the floor.  But what they lack in talent and youth, they more than compensate with their passion and energy.  And the film follows them through all the trauma and dramas of the next few months including homophobia, physical injuries, their nagging self-doubts, and all the accompanying personal dramas

It is a joyous story about bravery and courage as much as the dancing itself.  Anny started it when she decided to open her Dance Studio solely for same-sex couples in Melbourne of all places, and in what seems like a suburban backwater … and a very straight one at that … (note to self, NEVER ever visit Melbourne), this move was both admirable and part foolhardy.  It seems however to have been a big success and it provided a haven for her odd bunch of budding dancers as they try to live out their dreams. 

As the months pass and we get to know the couples more we share their anxieties as they are woefully underprepared for dancing on a world stage. One of the joys of the movie is that is gives us glimpses into the real lives of this merry little band away from the dance floor. Two middle-aged men bicker gently as one always forgets a new move as soon as he has learnt.  One of the pair is a mid-wife and the camera catches him practicing his steps down the hospital corridor and a really  strange sight for any poor passing stranger. The men are unintentionally hilariously funny especially when the shorter partner decides to put on what he thinks is a sexy face when doing the Latin American dances.  It's a look that can only make you burst out laughing helplessly as the audience I saw this with did every time.

They there is Bridget still in remission from her recent bout of breast cancer which has given her and her partner another reason to celebrate their life together by dancing.  And Tania who’s knees are so bad it's a miracle that she is walking, let alone dancing.   Each one has a different story but without single exception they are overwhelmingly happy and rather joyous people who just love dancing because it simply enriches their lives, and because they have a great deal of fun together.

Prior to the Games the group actually get to dance just once in a space bigger than their wee studio, and the size of what they have  undertaken starts to sink in.  And when they finally get to Cologne and see all the competitors from all over the world, their hearts sink.  And so do ours. These people are real pros.  Albeit far too heavily made up and with scary coiffures and the most ridiculously over the top costumes.  They are also far too intensely serious, and we start to slowly appreciate that amongst these gay dancing heavyweights (well, not literally) it's these few Australian couples who are going to have the most fun.  Eventually.  First the men’s planes have been delayed a few days and they will make it to Germany but only after the Opening Ceremony.  And two of the girls are still trying locate their missing luggage with all their costumes in it … evidently it was last sighted in Hong Kong.

And then the Competition starts in earnest, and as this is a documentary and not a fairy story (!) the Australians are eliminated in the early rounds. We share their every anxiety as they spin around the floor trying to remember their steps and avoiding bumping into other couples. Sometimes they actually succeeded in both. There is cause for celebrating too as one of the couple actually win 2^nd Place in their Class.  And then just when they are all about to call it a day and go off sightseeing the two middle-aged men who had really lost the plot half way through their jive routine were told they had won a Gold Medal.  We dont know why, but it made a happy ending to the story.

From the same country that gave us the sensational 'Strictly Ballroom' some 20 years ago, we now have this latest dancing treat. It may not be in the same league but it shares the same spirit.  Be warned the fun is infectious, and this immensely enjoyable heartwarming movie will have you itching to get those patent pumps out again.

PS And the one thing I learnt from this is that in Ballroom Dancing there are now no such things as ‘men’s part’s’ or ‘women’s part’s, evidently the different roles are called ‘followers’ and ‘leaders’.  And I know which one I want to be.

PPS I saw this movie as part of the MGLFF and it is currently doing the Festival Circuit.  I would so urge you to see it .. if you liked 'Mad Hot Ballroom', you'll LOVE this.  Check out their facebook page to see where the next screenings are. 

★★★★★★★★

WE HAVE A POPE

At the start of Nanni Moretti’s wonderful rich and glorious new movie the College of Cardinals are shuttered away in the Vatican to go through the traditional ritual of choosing a new Pope in great secrecy now that the last one has shuffled off his mortal coil.  As the camera scans down the long line of these scarlet clad old men each one of them is desperately praying so he doesn’t get chosen.  They all look like that cannot cope with pressure of this enormous task even though they will inevitably choose yet another really old man who has barely a few years left on earth and thus will soon be back to sit through the whole painful process yet once again before you can say many Hail Marys!

This time there are a few rounds of voting stalemate and the results are evenly divided between the predicted front-runners. Then with one accord a large majority switch their secret votes to elect the  relatively unknown Cardinal Melville as a compromise candidate. Of course he is not that at all, as everyone keeps repeating, rather it is ‘the will of God’.  And it’s because of this fact, that a rather distraught Melville accepts the job of being the next Pontiff

The white smoke is signaled from the Vatican to the waiting crowds in St Peters Square below that the election is over and everybody waits for the new Pope to make his first appearance in the balcony to make his address to the faithful.  He is all bedecked in his new white papal finery and so one of the cardinals goes ahead and to announce him but midway through the speech the Pope sitting in an antechamber loses his nerve and screams out loud and runs back to his private apartments, leaving everyone hanging in mid air.

Doctors are called and they declare the Pope physically well, so they send for a psychotherapist even though they are not really approved of by the church, well the Catholic one anyway.  There is one a hilarious scene where the Cardinals place so many obstacles in the psychiatrist’s path that it is nigh on impossible for him to conduct a proper consultation. He does however recommend that maybe his wife, who is also a Psychiatrist who is obsessed with the theory of ‘parental deficit’, could maybe be more helpful to the Pope’s present state. That said the Cardinals then advise the hapless Shrink that for obvious security reasons he cannot be allowed to leave the Vatican in case any word about the Pope’s state leaked out.  In fact despite all the media speculation, even the identity of the new Pope had not been revealed yet and they claimed he was still locked away praying and seeking help from God for his new task.

In great secrecy the Pope is dressed in ‘civvies’ and whisked away to the Psychiatrist’s Consulting Room for a private appointment.  He tells his minder that he needs some fresh air so will walk for awhile but he  then suddenly manages give them the slip, and is at last alone in Rome.  As no one has the faintest idea who he is, he soon becomes just another anonymous stranger in the city.  He befriends members of a local theatrical troupe and professes that he has really wanted to be an actor all his life.

Meanwhile back in the cloistered confines of the Vatican the frustrated Psychiatrist takes it upon himself to organize card games and a  Volleyball Tournament that not only distracts the Clerics but works them up into unaccustomed excitable competitive fervor.  The Pope’s PR man hasn't fessed up to the Cardinals that the Boss is missing so he secretly installs one of the Swiss Guards in the Pope’s private apartments telling him to just keep ruffling the curtains so the waiting crowds below, and the Cardinals,  will think he is there and meditating.

It is a very delightful tragicomedy that certainly makes fun out of the situation and all the pomp and circumstance of the Vatican, but is never anything less that respectful to the Church itself.  The wonderful French actor Michel Piccoli who brings such love to the lead role makes this highly emotional story plausible.  Aged 86, this veteran of some over 200 movies, and winner of countless of Awards would have so got my vote for Pope too.  The psychiatrist was played by writer/director Morreti a multi-talented award-winning filmmaker that excels both sides of the camera (Check out 'Quiet Chaos' I blogged last year).  I was so impressed with all the shots of the Vatican that I was convinced that they must have made the entire movie in situ instead of a Sound Stage at the Cinecitte Studios as I later found out.

And then there is the final scene of the movie that I was totally unprepared for and which took the wind from my sails.  It took the story to another level, and if I was cynical (!) and this had been a Hollywood production then I would have assumed that they had set themselves up to make a sequel.  But it isn’t, so I guess we will never know what happened next. God willing or not!

I am not religious at all but when it comes to movies I do have catholic tastes (note the small c) and this is definitely one that fits in with that.

Unmissable.


★★★★★★★★★

HOSPITALITE aka Kantai

Koji Fukada’s strange odd wee movie teeters between being a droll farce and an absurdist comedy, and it is very intriguing to say the least.

Mikio is a meek little man inherited a small printing business from his father and which he runs from a narrow rickety building which is also home for him and his Natsuki young new wife and their child.  His newly divorced sister has moved back in to this cramped space too.  One day Kagawa a total stranger turns up bearing news of the family’s missing parrot, and he also claims to have been an acquaintance of Mikio’s father.  He very quickly inveigles himself into a job and before the day is out has also moved into a tiny room upstairs.

Then next day totally unannounced Kagawa’s white wife shows up and moves in too without a word.  Annabelle claims to be Brazilian, but is maybe from Bosnia (!) and her halting English is as bad as her Japanese. It doesn't however stop her sunbathing naked and leading weak Mikio astray. Meanwhile Kagawa gets stranger by the day and takes Natuski aside to inform her that he knows she has been cooking the printing shop books so that she can pay the blackmail demands of her ex-con brother, and so he brings the situation to a head by actually giving the brother a job in the Print Works which he has by now made himself de facto in charge of.

If the wee house is not already full to bursting Kagawa then invites about 20 assorted European/American travelers to move in too.  They are, he claims, just visiting relatives.  It makes little sense but it does stir up the xenophobic fears of the nosey local neighborhood watch committe who get the police to raid the housel

Even as I write this now I still cannot fathom what it was all about (and I’ve not even touched on all the sub-plots) but I have to admit I sat there right to the very end eager to know how it would turn out.  Bored?  Never!  Confused? Yes, most of the time?

I have to say though there is something strangely intoxicating about the whole very weird piece.  Maybe the fact that one can relate to Mikio and Natuski lives which seem to be so straightforward as they plodded blinded through every day, and that it took a stranger in their midst, who by shaking the whole thing up made them realize that they weren’t that happy after all. 


Or then again, maybe not!  The jury’s still out on this one.


★★★★★★★

SPINNIN'

This exuberant and highly watchable debut film from director/writer/editor Eusebio Pastrana is essentially about a gay couple who struggle to fulfill their dream of having a child, but its actually more a story about his utopian vision of a world in which all couples, whether gay, straight, or in between, can live happily within the full spectrum of modern families.

For both Garate and Omar it was love at first sight, and their ridiculously impossible but immensely touching scene when they first meet, sets the pace for this enchanting wee comic love story. Pastrana sets it in Madrid in 1995 where he reimagines that cynicism does not exist as it deals with virtually every life-and-death experience with all the couple’s friends and neighbors. He peppers it with a running gag of showing 101 different kisses throughout the course of the story.

Omar and Garate are both totally dedicated football fans. In Omar’s case it was a passion he picked up from his father who has never got over his Team losing their big Final or the fact that his only son prefers a hairy chest over one that can give him a grandson the old fashioned way.   The more determined that Omar & Garate are to become fathers the more obstacles they encounter (most of them hilariously funny) , until they meet Racquel a pregnant women who’s boyfriend has just died of AIDS.  Racquel is the most gentlest of lost souls and when she marries the couple and they provide two dads for her son it looks like life could be perfect.

Omar firmly belives  that the ecstasy of  any  moment or the desperation of any situation can be expressed best by just standing and spinning on the spot.  A theory he is happy to share with anyone who will join him and literally deal with their emotions through the sheer physical realease of just going round and round really fast.

I firmly believe that Spanish filmmakers are the masters of this genre of gay romantic comedy dramas.  They fill the screen with such fully-rounded warm really believable and extremely likable characters, odd as they are at times.  They imbue the story with such  vitality and a genuine passion for life that never fails to engage you fully and has you leaving the theater with a big smile and wishing if only life was just like that.  And that more movies made you feel this good too.

Great debut Snr Pastrana, I cannot wait to see what’s next.

★★★★★★★★

JIG

From the sublime to the (seemingly) ridiculous I've  done a balletic leap from reviewing Dancemaker, the profile on modern dance genius choreographer Paul Taylor, to a documentary that trailed various assorted kids of different ages and sizes around world as  they get ready to dance their wee sturdy legs off in the 40^th World Irish Dance Championships.  Each movie was totally exhilarating and joyously entertaining in completely different ways, although after sitting through ‘Jig’ I was emotionally drained.

For those of us that first became aware of Irish Dancing when Michael Flatly burst onto our television screens, and then all over the world’s stages some 20 years ago, you may be shocked to know that its been around for several hundred years and is revered as a traditional art form. However after watching this new movie I just assumed that it started in the 1940’s as for some inexplicable reason that was never ever explained all the wee tots of young girls that take their dancing (too) seriously, without single exception, dress up with hideous curly Shirley Temple wigs piled up high on their heads and topped with a sparkling diamante coronet!  I mean its actually in keeping with the garish brightly colored heavily embroidered dresses they wear them with, all finished with so much make-up plastered on their young childish faces that one would think that they were training to be hookers and not hoofers!

Asides from their very strange attire I was in total awe of how this odd bunch of kids totally dedicate every single waking moment of their young lives to this highly specialized style of dance which looks like a killer to perfect, and far too weird too watch for too long a time.  Sue Bourne's film kept pace with several of them as they practiced their rigorous competition routines at Irish Dance schools all around the world (who knew there were so many, and more importantly who knew that all the teachers are sadistic  bullies!) 

We follow a teenage boy whose parents gave up work and sold up their home in sunny California so that he could get the best training in Birmingham UK (think Detroit without car factories).  But by then we had learnt that for any kid to succeed in this field, the parents must pay dearly and suffer. The mother of 10-year-old John aka Irish Dancing’s own Billy Elliot spends every penny of her wages keeping him dancing even though her working class family really cannot afford it.

We even get to watch some young Russian women who discovered Irish dancing late in life (but how, or why, I’m not sure) and they are trying to train to enter their entire group in the ‘Worlds’ as everyone calls the championships.  Their hopes of glory are shattered before they even get there as half the team are refused Visas to travel.

By the time we reach the Competition itself in Scotland filmmaker Sue Bourne has ensured that we have our hopes heavily invested in all the young hopefuls, and her tightly edited film has us on the edges of our seats exactly like the parents who have been there before, many many times.  Once they started dancing, it was way too difficult to differentiate who were the real stars, as they all seemed to frenetically flail themselves over the stage each one with their straight rigid backs and their arms never ever lifting from their sides even once.

The young Californian won a genuine standing ovation  from people other than his parents  so we knew he was a definite champion.  But the others had to endure this excruciatingly painful and sadistic procedure where each of the judges scores (they can award anything from 1 – 1000) are called out in turn for the every candidate in order and so you'll have to be mathematical genius to add these diverse figures up instantly in your head.  It did however make for good viewing watching the tiny tots and they parents faces as they desperately tried to work out if they should cheer or cry.  Only after every single figure is read, do they finally announce the winner, but by that time I had no fingernails left.

The good news is that even in you get placed 10^th you get a medal. The bad news is that in each section, there is only one World Champion.  And the next chance to try for the title is another long year away with many many more hours of grueling practices and many more of those hideous wigs to wear and sparkly dresses to buy.

I loved every single foot stomping minute of it.  It was a sheer joy of a movie even though I would never ever EVER want to go to sit through a live performance. If you loved 'Mad Hot Ballroom', you'll love this one too.


★★★★★★★★

DANCEMAKER

In my seemingly never ending quest to bone up on American cultural icons that never featured in my British upbringing, I saw ‘Dancemaker’ a portrait of the subliminal Paul Taylor the celebrated choreographer who is possibly the greatest creator of modern dance in this country.

In the 1950’s even though he was dancing with the famed Martha Graham Company (Ms. Graham called him ‘the naughty boy of dance') and he danced for Balanchine’s New York City Ballet, he still focused on starting up his own Company.  It was highly unusual for one so young to break loose at the start of his career, but Taylor was anything but conventional in everything he ever did.  The early dances he composed and starred in often-covered very dark topics such as sending men to war, to very sensual works that covered love and sexuality in all gender combinations, and they all made him and the Paul Taylor Company very famous comparatively quickly.

In the early 70’s he retired from dancing to focus on creating new works always pushing the boundaries as far as he could. His subject matters were nearly always controversial and he set dances to an eclectic mix of music that included Rock, Tango, Tin Pan Alley and Barbershop Quartets, Medieval masses, baroque concertos, classical symphonies, and avant garde scores by Cage, and even telephone time announcements and loon calls.

Mathew Diamond’s documentary (made in 1998) opens with Taylor about to create a new work for the Company's upcoming New York Season, always the most important two weeks in their year.  He comes to the studio with some music in his head but very little else, but somehow with his trusting troupe of dancers involved in the process, a complete and sensational dance is eventually created.  It's an exhilarating event for us the viewers to witness as it unfolds in front of our very eyes.  One can only guess what a high it must be for the dancers themselves.

Taylor’s ambivalent attitude to his troupe ‘my family’ is fascinating to witness.  Generous to a fault in his praise and giving credit to all the major players that keep the Company the success that it is, he can also suddenly turn and fire people who seemed to be his favorite only the day before.  In one instant he returned from a Tour of India and immediately sacked one of the dancers, and when his motives were questioned he simply replied ‘it’s just not interesting working with her anymore'.

Now aged 79, rather than sitting on his laurels and letting people assume that he has already done his best work, he’s still creating brand new work that is still met with both commercial and critical acclaim. And even to my uncultured (dance) eye, its all stunning and breathtakingly beautiful.

What also impressed me was how his peers in the Arts consider this man’s work.  He has collaborated with artists such as Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, Ellsworth Kelly and William Ivey Long etc, and on another level, he has also encouraged dozens of young man and women to break out and start choreographing their own works.

Whilst Diamond’s Oscar nominated profile showed us glimpses of the real man behind the Dancemaster mask, we never learnt anything at all about his life at outside of he Studio apart from a hint of failed love affair in Denmark many years ago.  And maybe he assumed we would know too that Taylor has received every important honor given to artists in the United States. A Kennedy Center Honors, the National Medal of Arts by President Clinton, Doctorates galore and was elected one of ten honorary American members of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters,   the French capped it all with the Legion D'Honneur which is the highest accolade that they give out.

But most of all there is 'the work'!

Out on DVD , if you missed it the first time around , or if like me you want to discover what real genius is, then dont miss this  one.  The trailer is below as usual OR you can watch the whole movie on Youtube at Click for Dancemaker movie

★★★★★★★★★

SALMON FISHING IN THE YEMEN

There is no surprise as to what this new rom-com is about as the title says it all. Literally. Based on Paul Today’s best selling novel the movie comes across as  Hollywood’s patronizing way of saying that some Arabs are really quite nice people, even in they waste their new found wealth of silly harmless things.

Consultant Harriet Chetwode-Talbot’s wealthy Client, a Yemeni sheikh, asks her for help to fulfill his vision to introduce salmon fishing to his country that is mainly a desert. She in turn asks Fred Jones a humorless British Government official at the Ministries of Fisheries for help and he rejects the idea as being totally unfeasible. However, the Prime Minister's press secretary, Patricia Maxwell fastens onto it as a "good will" story of Anglo-Arab cooperation to distract the voters from ongoing bad news out of Afghanistan, and pressures Fred into working with Harriet and the sheikh to implement the project. He gradually comes to believe in the sheikh's quest. Estranged from his very cold fish of a wife, Fred falls in love with Harriet, whose boyfriend (of three whole weeks!) Robert  has just gone  Missing In Action in the war. After Fred declares his love to Harriet, Robert returns alive, requiring her to choose between the two men. The fish are released and the project seems to be succeeding, but it is sabotaged by local militants, who destroy the salmon runs. But when Fred sees some fish have survived, he regains his faith, and Harriet joins him to fulfill the sheikh's vision.

And they all live happily ever after. Except for Fred’s wife and soldier boy Robert, but then again no-one really cared for them anyway.

The story is as exciting as that, but it did have potential as the screenplay had been written by Simon Beaufoy, who had won an Oscar for writing 'Slumdog Millionaire'. and an Oscar Nomination for 'The Full Monty', so we know he can be really funny.  Trouble was the movie was directed by Lasse Hallstrom whose speciality is putting way too much saccharine into his pictures ('The Cider House Rules', 'Chocolat', 'Dear John' etc) and so the result was too much sap and not nearly enough zap.

Thank goodness for the ever-wonderful Kirstin Scott Thomas. As the brisk no-nonsense  hilarious Patricia Maxwell she made the whole thing bearable, especially in scenes where she is directing the Press and a hapless British Foreign Secretary in the middle of the salmon lake in the Yemen in a  manner so very reminiscent of Edina Monsoon.  Note to Ms Scott Thomas : please do more comedy as you have such a natural flair for it especially if you can make us laugh even in this droll piece.

B.T.W., its not that the 'stars' Emily Blunt and Ewan McGregor were bad as the fish loving lovers, but it was all so predictable that you wish they hurried it up a little.  Wait for the DVD, as a fast forward button is essential for this one.


★★★★★★

3

3 is really about 1 who wants both the other 2 who are not sure what they want.  In Tom Twyker’s sophisticated amusing (but not very funny) comedy a reasonably good looking couple in their 40’s in Berlin are bored with their successful lives and with each other.  She is the host of a pseudo intellectual TV talk show and far to clever for her own good.  He is an art engineer that makes constructions for artist’s installations for a company that is struggling.  They have been lovers for 20 years but never married or had children, and their sex-life has now ground to a halt.

In comes Adam.  He meets her through a work situation and then just suddenly keeps bumping into her around the City until they make it to all the way to his bedroom.  He on the other hand is dealing with the recent sudden death of his mother and is recovering from treatment from his newly diagnosed testicular cancer and he meets Adam at the local swimming baths.  They never make it out of the locker room the first time, but soon he discovers for the joy of having sex with a same sex partner.  He is not gay though, well not until now that is, but maybe we are to assume that all the traumas he has just survived could possibly turn him that way? LOL

Both of the couple feel like they have a renewed sense of purpose now that they have their separate secret love affairs, and they actually not only start fancying each other and making out again, but he finally proposes marriage and she accepts.

One evening there is a near miss of a disaster when they both go to a new Art Exhibit and separately spot Adam in the throng and they both start to quietly panic about the possibility of being found out.  It doesn't happen, but it's a warning that all this secrecy cannot last much longer.

Now as she is having so much regular sex with both her husband and Adam, she falls pregnant and rushes around to Adam’s apartment to confront him with the news.  Adam is not alone. Hubby is there too.  When they see each other its takes a while for the penny (or pfening) to drop as to why each of them are there.  It does eventually, and she flees.  To London actually where she discovers that she is expecting twins, but she has no idea who the father is.  She goes back to Germany to tell hubby how much she has missed him.  And how she’s missed Adam too.  He’s happy to hear this and tells her he feels the same.  And about Adam as well.

So the 2 become 3.  Well actually eventually 5 I guess.  But will they live hapilly ever after?  I’m not convinced at all.  The trouble is Adam.  He is simply really far too one-dimensional a character that it's a real stretch to see one person falling for him, let alone two really quite bright people.

Filmmaker Tom Tykwer on the other hand has far more dimensions.  He made the wonderful groundbreaking 'Run Lola Run' which I loved, and also 'Perfume, The Story of A Murderer' which I hated.  I’d place this new one  somewhere in the middle of those two.

★★★★★★