Netflix Review - Love Wedding Repeat (15)

We live in a universe that's ruled by chaos and chance, where all it takes is just one moment of ill-fortune for all our hopes and dreams to go right down the shitter.

The Gist: Mild-mannered Jack (Sam Claflin) is in charge of his sister Hayley's Italian wedding, no parents remaining alive to help organise proceedings. He's determined to get everything right for his troubled little sis (Poldark's flame-haired Eleanor Tomlinson), but events become complicated by unreliable 'maid' of honour Bryan (Joel Fry), Jack's vindictive ex-girlfriend complete with new plus-one and Hayley's cocaine-addled party-crashing ex (additional Poldark alumnus Jack Farthing). Further distraction comes for poor Jack in the form of Dina (Olivia Munn), the American journalist he so nearly got together with one year before. In among the mayhem might be his own best chance at love, but there are multiple ways in which the same day might work out for all concerned, some more disastrous than others...

The Juice: Love Wedding Repeat may be adapted from French farce Plan de Table, but it's plain even from a plot summary that its overriding influence is Richard Curtis. Four Weddings and a Funeral's lavish nuptial rites are transplanted into sun-drenched Italy, while the central conceit of exploring more than one time-line is reminiscent of Curtis' time-travel tale About Time (though Sliding Doors might be a more accurate Britcom reference point here). Even Claflin is channelling the self-deprecating affability of a young Hugh Grant and - in fairness - doing a decent job of it. 

The screenplay, courtesy of writer-director Dean Craig, is clunky in structure, while stronger in its individual moments of character comedy. The latter are helped along by neat performances across the board. Claflin and Munn have a nice romantic chemistry (you do root for them from the start), while Yesterday's scene-stealing Joel Fry works his shambling Rhys Ifans-style magic again, particularly when paired with Irish comedian Aisling Bea as his conversationally disastrous female equivalent. Slumdog Millionaire's Freida Pinto has tremendous fun as the ex from hell, while deft comic actor Tim Key adds to the brew of social ineptitude as Jack's nervously over-talkative friend Sidney.

The Judgement: 6/10. It all chugs along at a leisurely pace, rather than with real comic momentum, though there are a few good comedy punches along the way (including a glorious punchline for the central romance). And if it doesn't match the sheer champagne fizz of Four Weddings, there are enough bubbles in the glass to keep you entertained. There's also a genuine sense of sweetness, despite a central plot device involving the ill-advised use of a sleeping-drug. Don't worry - it's all well-intentioned, as is the film as a whole. Love Wedding Repeat will satisfy your lockdown romcom needs without every becoming too sickly. Enjoy.

Film Review - Fisherman's Friends (12A)

Retro's back, again.

The opening moments of Fisherman's Friends tell all you need to know about the experience ahead. A soaring shot of the Cornwall coastline to the a cappella strains of Cornish folk song 'Dan Kanaka' - you know this is going to be a change of pace, a warm and comforting ride. If you're in the mood for something gentle and charming and soothing to your troubled soul, so that moment promises, then this is your film. And to be totally fair, it's a promise well-kept.

Formed in the mid-90s and going on to achieve notable music-industry success, the Fisherman's Friends from Port Isaac, Cornwall provide the real-life core of this film. Around their evolution into recording artists is spun a fictional romantic comedy as cosy as their knitted sweaters. Danny (the ever-magnificent Daniel Mays) is a talent scout and all-round London player on a Cornish stag weekend with some of his music-business mates. On hearing the Friends belt out a sea shanty, he's cajoled into pitching them a record deal. It's all a joke on the part of his boss (Noel Clarke as a mocking industry a-hole), and in truth Danny is more interested in single mum and Fisherman's Daughter Alwyn (a positively glowing Tuppence Middleton) than the singers themselves. But their earthy camaraderie stirs something within his jaded soul and despite resistance from both Alwyn and her father (James Purefoy as the group's unofficial leader), he sticks around to try and persuade the boys regarding potential stardom.

Scripted by the co-writers of later-life rejuvenation tale Finding Your Feet, this is another does-what-it-says-on-the-tin piece of storytelling. You know full well that the salty fishermen (who also do a line in local sea-rescue) will have much to teach the shallow big-city lad. You never doubt that however dubious his motivations, he'll start to fall in love - with the girl, the people and the place. And you can bet that there'll be a few bumps along the road to success and mutual understanding. There's a bursting sackful of corn here, including predictable plot beats, hoary old jokes and sailors bursting into spontaneous song among the lobster pots. If you're a cynic with an antipathy to folk music and a sense that there's little wisdom to be gleaned from hardened Brexiteers (the Friends mistrust anyone north of the River Tamar, so I assume they have no time for the European Union), then this one might not be for you. Don't be too quick to judge though...

With this type of well-worn tale - material guy connects with what really matters - it's all in the execution, and here the execution is strong. The direction and cinematography bring out the best in the Cornish landscape, while Meg Leonard and Nick Moorcroft's script has considerable pith and wit. However it's the depth of performance that bring this story home, not least Mays' fish-out-of-water (land-mammal-at-sea?) music executive. The Brit star of Line of Duty and Swimming With Men brings much-needed likability to the laddish Danny and utter authenticity to his change of heart. It's a kind of moral turnaround that's dramatically hard to sell, but Mays achieves it with ease. Middleton radiates warmth in response as Alwyn, once she's lowered her prickly defences that is. Loyal to her Cornish roots, she's more culturally attuned than the older generations, and the couple's chemistry is sweetly believable. So is that between Danny and Alwyn's daughter Tamsin, due to an endearing performance from young Meadow Nobrega.

For many, though, it'll be the fishermen themselves who steal it through rich harmonies and banter. Sheer conviction saves them from being a bunch of crusty caricatures, that and the fact they gel so convincingly both on mike and off. Purefoy suggests a profound soul beneath a taciturn exterior, while I, Daniel Blake's Dave Johns and veteran character player David Hayman contribute lovely comic turns. (The latter forms a touching double-act with Maggie Steed, who plays his beloved missus.) And fans of droll Britcom Mum will enjoy Sam Swainsbury as the youngster in the musical pack - a more sensitive, less dim-witted version of his TV role.

The sneering part of me might once have dismissed this as 'perfect for Odeon silver cinema' - truly a slap-worthy comment. For one thing there's nothing wrong with a gentle-natured film accompanied by tea and biscuits on a wet Tuesday morning. (I know, because I slipped in once to catch up on a movie I'd missed). And for another, spirit-massaging feel-good has its place, especially when it's done as attractively as this. The story may be as old as the guys' sea-drenched shanties, but it's delivered with equivalent assurance. As friends go, you could do worse than hang out with this lot for a night. They know how to deliver a good time.

Gut Reaction: A few good laughs, several heartstring tugs and (for personal reasons) one full-on sob.

Memorable Moment: How to rout a posh wedding.

Ed's Verdict: 7/10. Fisherman's Friends does nothing you can't predict, but it does the predictable well with snuggly results. Go on, suck it and see.

DVD/Blu-ray Mini-Review - Swimming With Men (12A)

No one talks about swim club.

The Gist: Rob Brydon plays Eric Scott, a middle-aged accountant stifled by his job and despairing of his marriage, who discovers an all-male synchronised swimming team at his local pool. In the throes of his mid-life crisis he is welcomed by the group, men in similar turmoil to himself. 'Swim club' is as much a way of life/means of male-bonding as a hobby, and nothing to do with competition - that's until the prospect of the men's world synchronised swimming championship comes into view. Coached by pool employee Susan, the boys bicker and splash their way towards the possibility of international glory in their unlikely choice of sport.

The Juice: Swimming With Men takes clear inspiration from The Full Monty and while it doesn't share the 1997 phenomenon's social bite, it does have a few things to say about male identity and the soul-sucking nature of the modern workplace. It's all conveyed with warmth and humour, director Oliver Parker (Johnny English Reborn, Dad's Army) nicely conveying Eric's white-collar anguish and the zen-like calm he experiences underwater. Praise too for smart editing that sharpens the effect of an already well-crafted screenplay that weaves in multiple character subplots with ease. Brydon plays the hero with lugubrious charm (British TV viewers already know how naturally funny he is), while the other swimmers - Rupert Graves, Downton Abbey's Jim Carter, Daniel Mays, This is England's Thomas Turgoose and Adeel Akhtar - prove a consistently funny and likeable ensemble, who actually succeed in some impressive synchronised moves. And as Susan, Peaky Blinders' Charlotte Riley kicks their swimming-trunked backsides with surprising ferocity.  

The Judgement: 7/10. There's a good deal of fun to be had with this saggy waterlogged bunch and their comic-heroic attempts at looking graceful in water. While the premise is slight on paper and the script hits lots of conventional beats, the camaraderie between this bunch is tangible, providing much laughter with rather than at them and keeping the whole story comfortably afloat (badum tish!). Inspired by the true story of the Swedish men's synchronised swim team and featuring a cameo from that aquatic Skandi band, this is a thoroughly enjoyable Monty-esque romp that earns it feel-good moments and almost makes me want to go back to the pool. Almost.

Film Review - Slaughterhouse Rulez (15)

Stop worrying. What they gonta do - eat you alive?

Slaughterhouse Rulez is a raucous horror comedy and the first film from Stolen Pictures, a production company started up by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. They both feature in it too, inviting comparisons with their Cornetto Trilogy (Shaun of the Dead/Hot Fuzz/The World's End). Unfair, perhaps, since the Pegg/Edgar Wright-written opuses have a very specific kind of genius. Those are high standards to match - and while this new film has its pleasures, it only makes it part of the way.

Don Wallace (Peaky Blinders' Finn Cole) is a working-class lad who achieves a place at the prestigious Slaughterhouse, a private school of Etonian grandeur and pomposity. It's a training ground for the next generation of great and not-so-good, with a fierce pecking order and all the bullying that accompanies. The Headmaster (appropriately bat-like in robes to match his school nickname) has made a deal with a fracking company who have begun drilling on school property. What they disturb is a literally monstrous link with the sinister Slaughterhouse past. It's one that Don along with his new friends, like roommate Willoughby (Journey's End star Asa Butterfield) and goddess of the Sixth Form Clemsie Lawrence (Hermione Corfield) must attempt to survive over one blood-spattered weekend.

Written and co-directed by Crispian Mills, one-time lead singer with Kula Shaker, Slaughterhouse is at its best when mocking private boarding schools - as though Mills' own experience in such places is burnt into his psyche. Drab Classics lessons, a decadent and entitled Sixth Form, ritual hazing for juniors - it's all lampooned with relish, not least the notion that this is a training-ground for the British leaders of tomorrow. Tom Rhys Harries plays a Draco Malfoy-esque bullying prefect, while the high-point is Michael Sheen's headmaster, a preening and corrupt study in smugness with a love of old-school connections. The whole thing deliberately references classic school satire If.... , but splices it with schlocky monster-horror. 

Here's where the movie stumbles. Whereas Edgar Wright's trio of Britcoms combined and subverted genres with endless wit and invention, Slaughterhouse fails to link it all together into a satisfying whole or indeed to deliver it with a sufficiently sharp comic edge. There are great moments of satire and of horror-comedy splatter, but it never meshes successfully overall, while some mean-spirited moments clash with the broader tone. Neither Pegg nor Frost are developed enough to work as characters, and the same goes for the story's young leads. Cole and Corfield are likeable enough to make you root for them, but only Butterfield is given any real depth as the sardonic and tormented Willoughby. (Also young Kit Connor delivers a handful of satisfyingly funny moments as persecuted junior Wootton.)

There's enough that goes right in the film, including some impressive cinematography, to suggest what it could have been. And for sure Slaughterhouse Rulez entertains in the moment - not least during one extended sequences inside a Skoda. But with the Shaun of the Dead leads both taking on significant roles it's impossible not the make that Cornetto connection and be reminded of similar, substantially better movies. Shaun was a keeper. Slaughterhouse will entertain for an evening, but that's all. 

Gut Reaction: Laughed enough to make it worthwhile, but not enough to think about it afterwards.

Where Are the Women?: There are two gals in our plucky band of heroes rather than the token of yesteryear, and they're as well developed as anyone else (i.e. not very).

Ed's Verdict: 5.5/10. Passably entertaining, without living up to its potential. Best served up at home with a couple of beers.