56 UP

Director Michael Apted's outstanding series of movies that, at seven year intervals, has been revisiting the same 14 English children/adults since they were seven years old in 1964 is an extraordinary anthropological study that shows that life never turns out as we expect. The subjects that he chose came from all different social backgrounds in a very heavily class defined British culture, but in the end its not really this that marks them out but their persistent personalities that Apted captures so succinctly in each of the movies.

As we visit all 14 of them now at the age of 56 years old (the one that opted out of '49 Up' is back just to promote his new band) the interviews with them and their spouses are mixed in with footage of all the past movies that highlights how their lives have evolved. Sue, an East End girl who left school at the age of 16 to get married and have babies is now divorced and has a top administration job overseeing University Courses, whilst Suzy with her privileged background and destined for big things, changed her future completely when she also left school at 16 to become a secretary.

Symon, the ex Orphanage boy, has remarried and a happy family life of his own at last and and he and his wife are also foster parents, and even Jackie who swore off children completely in the earlier films now has three grown up sons.

Despite the fact that none of their lives went on the paths they thought/hoped it would (even John the successful barrister still regrets not being a politician too) they are all strike you as being very happy and extremely content with their lot.  The one marked exception is Neil, the University drop-out, and once homeless for a few years, whose circumstances change the most dramatically in each of the films. Now a local Councillor and a Church Canon in a remote village in Cumbria despite all his protestations in camera, always seems just one small step away from having a meltdown.

Witnessing these lives unfold and mature has been a wonderfully successful experiment .... occasionally a couple of the subjects complain that they are more dimensional than the movies show them to be .... but always reading between the lines of their interviews, Apted's portraits seems to me to be spot on for them all. Having grown up in the UK at the same time ..... and also as an ex Orphanage boy too ... I can particularly relate to so many of these lives. Andrew, the solicitor, summed it up well when he said that class structure still remains in the UK, but now its not based on heritage but purely on wealth.

Totally unmissable.

★★★★★★★★★★

Now available on DVD   

THE HAIRDRESSER aka DIE FRISEUSE

A morbidly obese unemployed hairdresser in Eastern Berlin is sent by Social Services for a job interview in a Hair Salon in a Shopping Mall which she fails to get the job as she is not 'asthetically pleasing' ..... the Owners actually words were “what we sell is beauty, and you’re not beautiful, my dear”.  Hard words, but very true. Kathi exaggerates her enormous size wearing the most bizarre array of clothes topped off with chunky wooden fruit jewellery.  It aint pretty.

Anyway, taking umbrage she locates an empty store next to the Salon and vows to set up on her own. No small task for a woman with no money or any business acumen, and when the State and the Bank won't cough up the capital, she resorts to helping smuggle Vietnamese illegal immigrants into the country.  Oh yes, her skinny sulky daughter who lives with her in their high rise tiny apartment suddenly stops hating her which makes no sense at all.  But then again very little did in this dreadfully unfunny movie that Netflix had suggested this as a comedy I would like!

Maybe you had needed to have been used to a miserable life in the old Communist East Germany under the Stasi to appreciate this humorless piece.? Discovering that it was directed by Doris Dörrie a highly awarded German filmmaker who cut her teeth directing Opera, adds resonance to the review I have just read (belatedly) in 'The Hollywood Reporter' who aptly noted that even when The Fat Lady Sang, very sadly it still wasn't over!

Unless you have an overwhelming desire to see a very very large woman get naked way too often .... and even have sex with a skinny Vietnamese guy  ..... and trust me, you won't ...... then you won't need to sit through this, as I did that for you!!!!

UNFINISHED SONG

Marion whose poor health has already left her debilitated is now told that the cancer has returned and that she should focus on enjoying the rest of the time she has left.  To her that means singing in the community choir with all the other local retired Seniors.  It also means relying more on Arthur her husband of some 50 years, who unlike her, is a grumpy old sod who never gets any joy out of life at all. Except he is devoted to his wife and this latest news has left him feeling both helpless and angry.

The Choir ... called 'The OAPz' ... have been entered into a Competition by Elizabeth their perky 30 something old leader, but first they must pass an audition to see if they are indeed up to scratch.  One of the pieces they perform is a solo rendition by Marion of Cindy Lauper's True Colors and not only does it insure that they are selected, but it also has everyone (including you the viewer) reaching for the Kleenex.

Marion dies, and an increasingly isolated Arthur who has always been an awkward father, tells his only son to stay away for good. Arthur takes to hanging outside the Community Hall where the choir practices and mopes around just smoking and generally feels sorry for himself. One night after Elizabeth gives him a lift home he reveals he can sing too.

OK .... you don't have to be much of a genius to work out the rest of the plot from there ..... I'm just kind of surprised that the screenwriters didnt also throw in a romance between the lovelorn Elizabeth and Arthur's single son just to insure that everyone in this story lived happily ever after.

The only reason that I saw this cloying saccharine movie is because someone had the good sense to cast Vanessa Redgrave and Terrence Stamp as the two leads and rescued this from being just another 'Lifetime for Women TV Movie'.  In fact they raised it so much more than that, and Ms Redgrave imbued her part with such sensitivity and dignity rather than play up the to heavy sentimentality attached to Marion's passing.  Likewise Mr Stamp subtly insured that instead of being angry at his obstinacy and his grumpiness, we were willing him to let the warmth he had suppressed for years finally break through. 

They both were such a joy to watch as they put some real substance into this lightweight story .... but then again, one wouldn't expect anything less from these two who have been acting their hearts out for at least half a century each.  I must confess that I still cannot get my head around that this grumpy working class man was once the dashing (very young) Sergeant Troy in 'Far From The Madding Crowd' back in 1967.

The other fact that I am having trouble taking on board is that this movie was written and directed by Paul William Anderson whose previous three movies have all been Horror Flicks.  Hmmmm. 

The fact that the music Elizabeth chooses for these old people to sing is Hip Hop and Rock with rather raunchy lyrics, will draw obvious comparisons with the 2007 Award Winning stunning Documentary 'Young@Heart' about a real choir of Seniors in Massachusetts that sang pop music to great acclaim. If you liked the earlier movie, then you will like this one, even though it is hardly in the same league.

In Movie theaters in the US now

★★★★★★ 

LEONIE

This is the true story of Leonie Gilbert : a fiercely independent American woman who constantly defied taboos at the turn of the 20th Century when she became the Editor, then Lover, then Mother of the child of Japanese poet Yone Nogucci in New York. And then when he abandoned her and his son to go back home to Japan and his wife (that she knew nothing about) Leonie followed him, and in society where women were even more scorned than in the US, she raised their son on her own to become the world famous artist Isamu Noguchi.

The story starts when Leonie as a Bryn Mawr graduate answers a newspaper advert and becomes the N.Y. Editor of the yet unpublished poet. She soon also becomes his mentor and co-writer and is the one who persuades publishers to accept his work. When she falls pregnant with his child, the rather cold and restrained writer cannot hot-tail it quick enough to get out of there.  And when the US political climate changes and outlaws inter-racial marriages Leonie takes her son to Japan to claim her rightful place besides Yone as his wife.  

Snag is, he has one of those already, something he had failed to mention previously. When this is revealed Leonie moves into the Japanese countryside, not knowing a word of the language and very little of its customs, and sets on a meager living as a English teacher.  Along the way this woman, out casted by most of the local society, and ignored by Yone (unless he wants something edited) gets pregnant again .... presumably by one of the pupils, but that is never revealed.

Young Isamu is perpetually playing truant from school and Leonie has sensed that whilst he has no aptitude for general subjects such as mathematics he is displaying an extraordinary aesthetic for every aspect of art.  As the family are about to move again, Leonie entrusts her ten year old son to design their new house from scratch.

As a young man Isamu asks to go back to the USA to study, and when he graduates, Leonie and his half sister join him there. And they live happily ever after.  Almost.  For the next six decades until his death in 1988 Isamu becomes a renowned artist/sculptor/landscape designer  and furniture designer (the Herman Miller Company still produce some of his designs).  What is clear from this account of his mothers, it is her free spirit, openness and courage that helped shaped her fatherless son against all odds to succeed.  He straddled the two cultures with the same ease that she eventually managed. and much of his artistic legacy is, as the NY Times enthused in his obituary 'bridges both the East and West.'

This movie co-written and directed by Hisako Matsui has been languishing on a studio shelf since it was completed in 2010 and I am not sure why. True, it lacks a little clarity in some of the story line, but overall it is an impressive account of a 'great woman behind a great man' story of the last Century.  Emily Mortimer, a discerning Brit actor who often makes some unusual career choices, is compelling as the determined and resolute Leonie. The nearest thing she has to a best friend is Catherine, is played by Christina Hendricks ('Mad Men') who helps narrate the story.   Shidô Nakamura ('Letters from Iwo Jima') plays Yone as such a cold fish, its kind of tough imagining what a young Leonie would have seen in him .... besides the poems.

Beautifully photographed too (New Orleans stands in for old New York) and something of a wee gem, even if like me, you are ignorant enough to have never heard of either Noguchi, let alone the daunting Miss Gilmour.

P.S. Ailes Gilmour, the other child, went on to be one of the early pioneers of American Modern Dance and was one of the first members of The Martha Graham Company, who her brother sometimes designed Sets for.

★★★★★★★★ 

Available on DVD and AMAZON VOD

THE END OF LOVE

Actor turned screenwriter/director Mark Webber's somewhat overly ambitious wee film is a piece of faction. He has melded parts of his own life and used his own 4 year old son as his co-star and embroiled a piece of 'what's the worst thing that can happen to me' scenario into an uncomfortable narrative.

The premise of the story is that Webber is a struggling bit-part actor in Hollywood, totally broke, and is a single parent to his four year old son Isaac after the boy's mother was killed in an accident.  (In real life the actress Frankie Shaw, Isaac's mother had separated from Webber).  Trying to deal with his own grief he totes the kid around on auditions and centers his whole day around him. There is never any doubt that he totally adores Isaac. When he meets Lydia a single mother who runs the local kids daycare center, Webber arranges a family play date for them all to hang put together. When this morphs into a romantic date for him and Lydia, he very oddly declares his undying love to this complete stranger, confusing both her and us too.

Isaac is unquestionably a  charmer and its extremely clever how Webber manages to incorporate the boy's ceaseless chatter and the odd temper tantrum into the plot.  I am not going to credit him with being a remarkable child actor because his performance is not an act at all .... although we are never sure if Webber's is either. It is in fact Isaac that engages our attention and deserves our affection, as the moment Webber is out playing on his own with 'the grown ups' he shows himself up to be a rather vapid selfish deadbeat.

At a party hosted by actor Michael Cera at his home Webber's behaviour is no more erratic and unpredictable than the host's, but it finally closes the deal with us and we totally lose any interest in how this will all turn out.

Interesting concept, and I indulged Webber's performance in the first half of the movie as being justified by his grief, but as it veered towards such self-indulgence, I ended up wishing that this vanity project had at least some other outside creative direction to deliver the promise it started out with so enthusiastically.

★★★★   

Available on DVD & Amazon VOD

NICKY'S FAMILY

In 1988 Greta Winton was scrambling around the attic of the home in Buckinghamshire where she lived with her husband Nicholas and she uncovered a secret that he had kept from her and the whole world for 50 years. Her find was a detailed scrapbook that gave details of the daring plan her husband had masterminded to rescue Czech Jewish children and transport them to safe homes in the UK before the outbreak of World War 11 in 1939.  It contained lists of the 669 children he had rescued, the names and addresses of their parents, and the details of their new foster parents who looked after them for the duration of the War.

Winton was about to travel to Switzerland for a skiing holiday in Christmas 1938, when he decided instead to travel to Prague, Czechoslovakia, to help a friend who was involved in Jewish refugee work, and had called him asking for his help. There he single-handedly established an organisation to aid children from Jewish families at risk from the Nazis. He set up an office at a dining room table in his hotel in Wenceslas Square. He wrote directly to all the Heads of States in every major country asking for asylum, but only Britain would agree to take these children in.

With very little help, and few funds, and battling officialdom at every level, he secured the transport to make three journeys with trains packed full of children.  A fourth one was scheduled to leave Prague on September 3rd 1939 the day that War broke out but the train never left, and the children on board faced certain death.

Esther Rantzen, a BBC Journalist, took up the story in 1988, and invited Winton to appear on 'That's Life' TV Programme where he was shocked to discover that the Producers had also rounded up a few dozen of the survivors to greet the man who would become to been known as the 'British Schindler'.   

This selfless humanitarian who had kept his exploits quiet from the world for half a century was knighted by The Queen, and had countless honors heaped on him by the Czech & Slovak Governments as well as being nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.  In 2009, on the 70th Anniversary of the journeys, a special 'Winton Train' re-traced the journey from Prague to London full of survivors and their families that numbered many people who have also had very distinguished lives.

Winton, still alive at the grand age of 104 years old, has never ceased doing unsung work to help others in need .... his list of achievements since the War, is staggering. What is equally impressive, as detailed in this documentary, is all the good works that his example has inspired from the people whose lives he saved.  None of them ever saw their parents again, or even managed to achieve much 'closure' on their deaths, but what Winton gave them all was a chance and a reason to live.

A wonderful insight to a most remarkable human being. A hero in the true sense of the word. Totally unmissable.

★★★★★★★★★

Now available on DVD and AMAZON VOD

I KNEW IT WAS YOU : REDISCOVERING JOHN CAZALE

In the 1970's John Cazale starred in five motion pictures all of which were nominated for Best Picture Oscars (with 4 of them winning them). His co-stars were the heavyweights of the profession and between them they collected another 12 Oscars for their work in these classic movies, and in this HBO Documentary they lined up one after another to wax lyrically about their peer.  Yet nobody outside of their world can even remember his name.

Born in 1935 in Revere Massachusetts and of Italian descent, his first job in New York was a messenger where he worked alongside another would-be actor Al Pacino.  The two of them were doing summer stock and staying in a communal house in Provincetown when Israel Horowitz cast them in his latest play which won both men Obie Awards back in N.Y. and turned out to be their breakthrough roles.

Pacino's star rose quickly and he was already cast as Michael in 'The Godfather' when Cazale landed his first major movie role as Fredo his older brother.  He went on to star alongside Pacino in 'Dog Day Afternoon' as well as reprising his role as Fredo in 'The Godfather Part 11' in which in one the movie's most memorable scenes, Michael finally accuses his brother of betrayal with 'I knew it was you' .....giving us the title for this look back at both the actor and the man.

His other two roles were in 'The Conversation' and then finally in 'The Deer Hunter' by which time his lung cancer had kicked in and as the Producers could not get insurance on him, Robert DeNiro personally underwrote the risk as everybody knew that Cazale was perfect for the part.  He died in 1978 before the movie could be released at the age of 42 years old.

The passion for his craft was the focus of what all the actors that were interviewed for this doc raved about.  That, and the fact that he brought such a sharp intensity to each and every role as Pacino testified, it made everyone else in that same scene give much better performances.  His love of the theater also gave him the love of his life .....Meryl Streep, who met him when they were performing Shakespeare in the The Park, and they later starred in 'The Deerhunter' together too, and she was with him until the very end. 

This is such a fascinating glimpse into an extraordinary man that achieved so much and left such a fine body of work as his legacy. It makes for a perfect record to help us remember the man whose face (from 'Dog Day Afternoon' in my case) is etched in our memories, but not his name.  It certainly has triggered me to want to o back and re-look at each of the five magnificent movies he was in, and re-discover John Cazale.

★★★★★★★★★

REALITY

Luciano is a gregarious fishmonger with his own Stall near his home in one of the old quarters of Naples. He is not just one of the few men in his sprawling family of numerous aunts and cousins, but he is always the life of soul of their group.  One day when his wife and three young children are shopping in a nearby Mall with the entire family in tow, they come across a TV Production Company who are looking for people to try out for 'Grande Fratello' Italy's own smash hit 'Big Brother'. The kids phone Luciano, and encouraged by the family, persuade their Dad to immediately leave the Stall and rush over to audition.

He arrives to late but as he recently had a brief encounter with Enzo a former star of the Show who is hosting the event, he persuades him to get the Producer to still let him audition.

A few weeks later Luciano gets a phone call inviting him to the Cinecittà Studios in Rome for a follow up interview and screen test. When he emerges after this is over to greet his anxious family, he tells them that all the other applicants had been given a mere five minutes, whilst his session with the Producers had lasted over an hour.  This has convinced him that being offered  a place in the Big Brother House is a mere formality.

Word travels faster than him, and he returns home to Naples to tumultuous applause like the conquering hero that TV stars are feted like these days.  Over the next few weeks he is congratulated by the whole neighborhood whilst he waits for 'the call'.  As the weeks drag on he starts to develop a paranoia that the TV Company want to check out his story and also test him to see what type of man he is. So he believes that every single stranger he spots in his locale is spying on him to see if he is in fact a good soul .... and eventually as he is convinced that this is the one thing stopping him being on the TV Show, he sells up the Fish Stall, and much to the consternation of his wife, starts to give away all their possessions to homeless people in the street.

For a man like Luciano whose life up to now has been scrambling for a living in a decaying inner city the lure of the high glossy shiny life depicted in a Reality TV Show is too much to pass up on.  And it seems like the struggle to get their at all costs is not just for himself but all the others like him.  Like the Papal procession he encounters on his way to break into the Big Brother House, it bears no relevance at all to the life that he and most other people lead.

The story behind the movie itself is equally as interesting, directed and co-written by Matteo Garrone, and its a far cry from his last bleak movie 'Gomorrah' a harrowing fictional look at organized crime ....one of the best films of 2008.  And his stunning lead actor Aniello Arena who was so central to making this work, is currently serving a life sentence in prison for murder, and was given special permission to be allowed out on a daily basis to shoot this movie.

It's a bittersweet comedy/drama about how obsession can lead to desperation  ..... 'this is our chance' Luciano screams at his wife, but by then she wants to let go. And we want him too as well.

★★★★★★★★

THE WAY WAY BACK

The title of this charming coming-of-age bittersweet comedy refers to the rear facing third seat in a massive old station where put-upon young Duncan is sat for the journey to the beach house for the summer vacations.  The other passengers  .... his mother, and a teenage girl are asleep, so Trent his mother's new boyfriend who is driving, seizes the opportunity to pick on Duncan.  He asks the awkward teenager on a scale of one to ten, how would he rate himself.  When the kid reluctantly answers with '6', he is slapped down with the response from Trent, that he is no more than a '3', thus zapping the poor boy's confidence even more.

And so the nightmare summer for a seething immature Duncan begins. Ignored by his mother who is trying everything to please her new boyfriend who likes to party with his drinking buddies/best friends who never seem to ever be sober or absent. Trent's spoilt 'wordly' teenager daughter just taunts her prospective new sibling before she ditches him to run and play with her fast crowd. The perpetually drunk pushy next door neighbor tries to dump her cross-eyed younger son onto him, and although her teenage daughter shows some friendliness,  tongue tied Duncan simply does not know how to respond. 

One day out of sheer boredom he finds a bike in the garage and cycles off to explore the town and comes across a local Water Park and instantly bonds with Owen the sarcastic and potty-mouthed manager who has never really grown up, just like the rather jaded amusement park that is his home. Owen is the only one who sees some real potential in this sad lonely teenager who he employs to do odd-jobs.  It is the making of Duncan who blossoms and not only finds his own feet and some confidence too, that for the first time he actually makes is able to make friends ........with all the quirky bunch of co-workers.

He keeps the fact that he has a job a secret from his mother as it appears that this is not turning out to be a dream vacation for any of the others in the beach house.   With his mother's new relationship hitting a rocky patch, it is the newly intrepid Duncan who demands that she face reality, but when Trent reacts by spilling other unwanted secrets, he realises that not everything is exactly as it seems.

When his mother, in an attempt to salvage her new relationship, curtails the summer vacation, it is Duncan who doesn't want to leave and is totally devastated.

There is something very quaintly old-fashioned about this whole movie in a very charming way. Its the first one written and directed by actors turned Oscar-winning screenwriters ('The Descendants') Nat Faxon and Jim Rash who also appear on screen as part of the Water Park crew.  Rash had a similar experience in his youth of being asked to grade himself which is what he based the screenplay on, which gives a resonance to the piece (and maybe the reason for the nostalgic touches?)

Great casting makes it a notch or two above being just good.  Steve Carell as the bad stepdad, a thoughtful Toni Collette in an understated role as Mother, the delightful Alison Janney as a funny over-the-top neighbor, and Maya Rudolph as Owen's long suffering side-kick/girlfriend.  The scene stealers of the piece were unquestionably Sam Rockwell pitch perfect as Duncan's other dad Owen, and young TV star Liam James with such a wonderfully convincing turn as the nerdy teenager.

Credit too for the fact that the relationship between Owen and Duncan was a refreshing and natural friendship between mentor and stumbling teenager without any of the paranoia that seems to want to mark any such attachments between same-sex friends of different generations as unhealthy or even pervy nowadays

If I have any 'buts ' at all about this movie, it would be over the ending which was a bit of a damp squid, and could/should have been so much better.  That said, I am off to find myself a summer job at the nearest Water Park .....it looks like so much fun........

★★★★★★★★

ARCADIA

Filmmaker Olivia Silver's debut narrative is a rather interminable road movie that spends so long getting nowhere.  A dysfunctional young family is forced by their father to suddenly move across country from New England to California. At dawn one morning he simply hustles them into his station wagon heading towards a new job and a new home with the promise that their absent mother, who is allegedly away visiting her sister, will join them out there later.

Nothing about this new development in their lives is clear to the three kids, although they suspect that their mother would hate this move as much as them. Their father with his short-fused temper is giving little away and any news that is revealed about what its going on here is from overheard snatches of his phone conversations during which he is always screaming at someone.

The story is seen through the eyes of 12 year old Greta, known as Griz, who although just starting puberty, still clings on tightly to Harrison, her stuffed rabbit.  Although she is the middle sibling, she is the most sensitive one, and also the one who is desperate to know the truth of what is really happening. Sensitively played by veteran child actress Ryan Simpkins, Greta is clearly the best thing about this rather lack-lustre uneventful story.

Dad is played by the talented John Hawkes but he has been given very little here to get his teeth into. When he can finally prove that he is not the total liar his children believe him to be, its too little too late.

Most of the action takes place inside the car as it treks it way across the continent and the kids seem reluctantly resigned to their confinement.  We really share their relief when this long journey is finally over.

★★★★

SOMM

Jason Wise's captivating new documentary is a study of sheer obsession. That, with more than a degree of insanity, are evidently two of the essential qualifications you need to become a Master Sommelier. Oh yes, an encyclopedic knowledge of wine helps too.  This nail-biting movie follows four such fool-hardy and intrepid young men as they prepare and sit the examination that less than 200 people have passed in the 40 years since it first was given in the U.S. to attain this rare and exalted status.

Ian Cauble is the most single-minded and overly serious of the four who study together into the wee hours of the morning and who have become fast friends.  The others have nicknamed this whizz kid as 'Dad'.  Like him, the other three viz Brian, Dustin and Dlynn are already Sommeliers working in high-end restaurants, but life to these guys will not be complete unless they can gain this ultimate highest accolade.

There are three parts to the exam ..... which incidentally can only be sat once a year .... theory, service and the hardest of all, tasting. For the latter they are each presented with 6 different wines and within 25 minutes must not only describe every nuance and flavor but determine both the country and region of origin, and the year of vintage before then naming it.  They amount of knowledge they must consume is matched by all the countless gallons of wine they must sample.  As the film progresses and we witness the four studying/arguing/drinking in preparation they never hide the fact that the whole brutal process is sheer torture.  Their neglected wives/girlfriends just left with with the task of emptying their spittoons next morning for at least a year, are nothing more than wine widows.

By the time the big weekend in Dallas for the two days of reckoning comes around we are so emotional invested in the outcome for each of them that we share the scary intimidation they face from the current Masters who are about to test them.    No spoilers here at all as to the outcome, but I will just say that you are left dangling until the closing frames of this gripping documentary, and you will need more than one glass of wine when by the time it ends.  And trust me, it you wont spit it out afterwards.

If your nerves survived 'Kings of Pastry' the 2009 documentary by D A Pennebaker when top French chefs baked their way through fierce competition to be named a 'Les Melleurs Ouvriers de France', then you will so love this engaging movie too.

Currently in selected movie theaters and on VOD via Itunes.

★★★★★★★★

THE BLING RING

Rebecca is a teenager living in Los Angeles who has a passion for shiny things and an obsession with skin deep celebrity fame.  Her middle class parents have separated and seem to exert little or no influence over this spoilt young girl who believes that she is entitled to better possessions/life even if they are not hers for the taking.  From stealing purses and wallets from unlocked cars with her new friend Marc that she just met at Indian Plains the High School that takes all the of society's misfit kids, she is soon emboldened to start burglarising houses of 'stars' that the celeb-watching websites have announced are out of town.

For Rebecca and Marc, and the other teenagers that they cajole to join them for subsequent robberies, its not just about ransacking the places but carefully selecting treasured pieces of the star's wardrobes that they want to have/wear.  As well as believing that are entitled to these expensive clothes and trinkets, the fact that belong to some B or C List Star that they idolise is their main incentive. Discovering a stash of money is simply a bonus. 

This develops into theft on a grand scale as their hauls get bigger by this group of all white rather privileged teenagers who are not committing these crimes to feed their families, or a drug habit, but simply to pamper to their egos.  Encouraged by the avalanche of media coverage on the excesses of anybody who has had 'five minutes of fame' that incessantly preach avarice and greed as being acceptable traits these days, which does not in anyway justify their lack of integrity, but somehow makes the whole thing sadly unsurprising.

This is filmmaker Sofia Coppola's fifth feature and though she carefully ensures that she doesn't take sides over the teenagers activities, she does however seem to take it far too seriously for my comfort.  The best part of the movie is definitely towards the end when the kids  are caught and and charged with the crimes, and their rather pompous statements about how the whole experiences will help them achieve goals of being world leaders etc with all the same sincerity of a Miss World candidate, are gloriously funny.

The plot somewhat annoyingly lacked clarity at times, and I am still confused as to why the fact that the sole boy Marc was so obviously gay, yet it was never referred too at all. However, credit where it is due .... and it was beautifully photographed by the late Harris Savides, and the fact the temple of bad taste that some of it was shot in, was in fact Paris Hilton's home, gave it some authenticity.  And a great young cast  ... Katie Chang as Rebecca, Israel Broussard as Marc and a scene stealing un-recognisable Emma Watson ('Hermoine Granger from Harry Potter') as the mouthy Nicki.

Mildly amusing, morally annoying.  I wouldnt rush out to see this one.

★★★★★★

MENTAL

There is an hilariously funny opening sequence when the camera swoops down from the nearby mountains to spot Shirley, a suburban housewife on the verge of a breakdown, hanging out her washing in her garden whilst she recreates the beginning of 'The Sound of Music' that she is totally obsessed with. Her five daughters however are not the Von Trapp Family but they too are also obsessed but rather than with Hammerstein in their case its the state of their own lack of mental health : each one claiming to have a more extreme diagnosis than her siblings.

Shirley's husband Barry is the Mayor of Dolphin Head the small coastal Australian town they live in, and he's a cheating liar who comes home so rarely he cannot even remember his daughters names. So when Shirley finally loses the plot, Barry has her quietly whisked away to an isolated Mental Institution so that her 'condition' doesn't hurt his re-election campaign, and than he picks up Shaz a foul-mouthed hitchhiker at a loose end and installs her to run the household. 

At first the girls are almost as terrified of this odd strident hippy as they are of her faithful pit-bull terrier who she uses to keep them all towing the line.  Her line that is.  But she assures the girls that they are not mental, they are just individuals, and to prove her point she goes out of her way to shock the family's uptight neighbor who has made their lives hellish for years.

Shaz has her own back-story but by the time we start to learn this, the steam and energy has run out of the piece, and the details of her convoluted past now makes for a bit of a yawn.

It's a pity that the whole almost fizzles into such a mess as this rather cute black comedy started out in such high dudgeon.  It reunited writer/director P J Hogan with Toni Collete whose breakthrough movie back in 1994 was the sensational 'Muriel's Wedding'.  However even the multi-talented Ms Collete giving it her customary all, cannot save this one .... credit where it is due the really funny parts of this movie are all down to her though. In fact most of the whole cast is well chosen .... I loved both Rebecca Gibney as the mother, and Kerry Fox as the neighbor ..... but I simply have no idea what Liev Schrieber was doing in this as Shaz's estranged husband, and by the look of things, neither did he.

There are very funny moments in this movie to put a big smile on your face, but you would have be 'mental' to watch this through to the end without a remote control in your hands.

★★★★★★

BREAKUP AT A WEDDING

I will confess that I was drawn to this very quirky wee comedy by its title and by its whole concept. Its a hybrid of a movie within a movie that's essentially a video of the wedding from hell. Alison the bride has got cold feet on the day she is about to marry Phil, who has got himself into serious debt to give her the extravagant wedding that she has planned with the most meticulous details.  As friends and family have arrived, and the Hotel will not give them a refund, she persuades hapless Phil to go along with the wedding as planned, but not to sign the wedding certificate so they will remain single.

Phil agrees to the sham as he was planning to present her with a surprise gift of her dream house at the Reception and that he hopes will make her change her mind, the one snag is that the wedding budget has swallowed up the deposit he had put aside, and if he cannot find some kind soul to cough up some ready cash, he will lose the house anyway.

All the manic action is viewed through the eyes of the wedding videographer who catches all the dramas on camera, even the parts that no-one wanted him to do.  Although its all fiction, the end result is rather like a mockumentary. 

The production is very much a family affair as director and co-writer Victor Quinaz plays the videographer on screen, and his younger brother Philip, another co-writer plays Phil the bridegroom. Victor was actually a wedding videographer in real life for a couple of years, and Philip actually got married a month after this movie was shot : I hope though its not based too closely on their own experiences. Like many low-budget indie productions the cast and crew are peppered with the brothers friends and mates who have collaborated with them before on other projects, which gives a feeling of warm camaraderie to the piece.

It's a sweet and charming little comedy but it has far more energy and enthusiasm than actual real laugh-out-loud moments.  And with a conventional rom-com happy ending, you are left wondering what the fuss was all about anyway.

★★★★★★★