Tag Archives: Comedy

Reviews

Whisky Galore! | Review

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★★★★

When a film spends over a decade meandering in ‘development hell’, with producers abandoning it and its purpose-built production company going into administration, there’s a certain degree of trepidation that inevitably comes with said film’s eventual release. In the case of Gillies MacKinnon’s Whisky Galore! (first touted in the early noughties), the sense of wariness is only heightened by the fact that this particular long-awaited feature is a remake of a perennial Ealing comedy classic, of the sort that really don’t need remaking. Well, naysayers begone, MacKinnon’s adaption – inspired by the 1949 film from Alexander Mackendrick, the Compton Mackenzie book that inspired it, and the true story that kickstarted the chain alike – is a joy to behold.

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Reviews

Mindhorn | Review

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★★★

Enter Mindhorn blind and you might be surprised at just how starry the, Sean Foley directed, production’s cast list is. Without giving away the full roster (including one particularly rib-tickling cameo), Andrea Riseborough – so powerful in Channel 4’s National Treasure – holds a prime billing here, as does Steve Coogan – whose production company, Baby Cow, has associate credits too. From The Mighty Boosh, meanwhile, Julian Barratt takes the lead role of Richard Thorncroft, the washed-up former star of hit eighties, Isle of Man cop-drama: ‘Mindhorn’. Thorncroft’s career, once so promising as to boast merchandise, has hit the rocks since then and his agent (Harriet Walter) has all but given up of him. This is, of course, predominantly due to Thorncroft’s penchant for offending both his co-stars and the entire population of the Isle of Man alike. An infamous interview having proved particularly damning: ‘We’ve never forgotten what you said about us on Wogan’. The epitome of his fall from grace is that he now even suffers from the indignity of having been replaced by John Nettles in adverts for thrombosis socks. To add insult to injury, Thorncroft’s lost weight in his hair and found it in his waist.

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Reviews

Their Finest | Review

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★★★

London, 1940. Bombs fall nightly in devastating Blitzkrieg air raids. A nation’s morale is at stake.

Lone Scherfig’s latest film, Their Finest, is not her finest. No, that remains the Danish-born director’s 2009 Oscar-nominated An Education. I suspect Their Best Available was, however, seen as a title that would have been rather harder to sell. Not that this a film short on selling points. Their Finest’s cast list alone boasts Gemma Arterton as its plucky heroine, alongside a well-cast ensemble comprised of Sam Claflin, Richard E. Grant, Rachel Stirling and Helen McCroy; not to mention, of course, its showpiece Bill Nighy, nailing the role of Bill Nighy. The problem is that Their Finest tries so hard not to descend to quaint sensibilities, as common in such WWII period fare (Dad’s Army most recently), that it does so at the expense of much attainable charm, exposing in the process an ultimately uninspired plot. Whilst Gaby Chiappe’s inaugural feature screenplay certainly hints at more biting possibilities, these moments are too few and far between to sustain any memorable momentum.

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