Rock 'N' Rolla'

Plot Outline:
Set in London, when a Russian mobster sets up a real estate scam that generates millions of pounds, naturally it catches the attention of some of the city's various members of London's criminal underworld, who'll pursue their share/opportunity of the fortune at any cost.

Prelude:
Lock Stock I saw quite late on, I found it a unique & decent film, but nothing too special. Snatch on the other hand was a masterpiece. Sure, there were similarities, but both films did hold their own as individual films. With Revolver, it lost this strength. It felt to me like a cross-breed of a number of films that had impressed me over the previous decade, shoved in a blender & not really mixing well due to the blender being full.

In the end, I was confused more than anything else. I have yet to see it again with the directors' commentary. Either the film was 'too' clever for the audience, or just really not. Though I'm leaning towards the latter, I am still hopeful that it may just click together upon the re-watch.

I knew not to expect a masterpiece, It had to be a downward dip, which it was, but it was overly so. It was no patch on either previous films. What happened? Well he had the guts to try out something different & stylistically it was pretty cool.

Gone Baby Gone'

Plot Outline:
Dorchester, one of the toughest neighborhoods in all of Boston, is no place for the weak or innocent. Its a territory defined by hard heads and even harder luck, its streets littered with broken families, hearts & dreams.

When 4 year old Amanda McCready disappears from her home and the police make little headway in solving the case, the girl's aunt hires two private detectives Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck) and Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan). The detectives freely admit that they have little experience with this type of case, but the family wants them for two reasons - they're not cops and they know the tough neighborhood in which they all live.

They cave eventually & open an investigation that will ultimately risk everything from their relationship, their sanity, their lives -- to find 1 little lost girl. As the case progresses, Kenzie and Gennaro face drug dealers, gangs and even paedophiles.

Teeth'

Plot Outline:
High-school student Dawn (Jess Weixler) works hard at suppressing her budding sexuality by being the most active member of the local chastity group. Her task is made even more difficult by a string of male admirers and her bad-boy stepbrother's provocative behaviour at home.

However, previously a stranger to her own body, innocent Dawn makes a shocking discovery about herself. At first terrified and upset, she soon realises she has a formidable defence mechanism to ward off unwanted advances - a set of teeth where you'd least expect...

The film begins with a young Brad and Dawn O'Keefe swimming in a pool. Mr. O'Keefe yells at his son to be nice to his new step-sister. Brad takes his penis out of his swimsuit and tells Dawn to show hers. Brad shrieks in agony as Mr. and Mrs. O'Keefe rush over to see what happened. Brad's finger is bleeding and it appears to have been bitten. Dawn smiles innocently at Brad.

12 years later, all grown up Dawn is in high school, she likes a guy at school, and he likes her. However having taken a pledge to remain chaste until marriage, they date in groups, watch G-rated films, and don't kiss, even though temptation beckons. When they do cave into their temptations... well, you can do the math ;)

Smart People'

Plot Outline:
Smart People is a story about a pompous English professor (Dennis Quaid), who in the years following his wife's death, has become a scrouge to his students and an emotionally absent father to his rebellious son James (Ashton Holmes) and his perfect preppy daughter Vanessa (Ellen Page).

When he suffers a concussion in a freak accident, he meets and unexpectedly falls for a beautiful tough E.R. doctor (Sarah Jessica Parker), a brilliant former student who is still harbouring a grudge over a bad grade he gave her years before. Things get more complicated when his slightly shady, n'er-do-well adopted brother Chuck (Thomas Haden Church) shows up, moves in and starts rocking the family boat.

As the professor juggles his fractious family and a new romance, he must learn to reconnect with the people around him and become the man he once was.

Definitely, Maybe'

Plot Outline:
Ryan Reynolds stars as Will Hayes, a 30-something Manhattan dad in the midst of a divorce when his 10-year-old daughter, Maya (Abigail Breslin), starts to question him about his life before marriage. Maya wants to know absolutely everything about how her parents met and fell in love.

Will's story begins in 1992, as a young, starry-eyed aspiring politician who moves to New York from Wisconsin in order to work on the presidential campaign. For Maya, Will relives his past as an idealistic young man learning the ins and outs of big city politics, and recounts the history of his romantic relationships with three very different women.

He hopelessly attempts a "PG" version of his story for his daughter and changes the names so Maya has to guess who is the woman her father finally married. Is her mother Will's college sweetheart, the dependable girl next-door Emily (Elizabeth Banks)? Is she his longtime best friend and confidante, the apolitical April (Isla Fisher)? Or is she the free-spirited but ambitious journalist Summer (Rachel Weisz)?

As Maya puts together the pieces of her dad's romantic puzzle, she begins to understand that love is not so simple or easy. And as Will tells her his tale, Maya helps him understand that it's really never too late to go back...and maybe find a happy ending.

Balls of Fury'

Plot Outline:
In the unsanctioned, underground, and unhinged world of extreme Ping-Pong, the competition is brutal and the stakes are deadly. Down-and-out former professional Ping-Pong phenom Randy Daytona (Dan Fogler) is sucked into this storm when the FBI recruit him for a secret mission to capture one of the FBI's Most Wanted (and his father's killer), Feng (Christopher Walken). But after two decades out of the game, Randy can't turn his life around and avenge his father's murder without any support. So he calls upon the spiritual guidance of blind Ping-Pong sage and restaurateur Wong (James Hong), and the training expertise of Master Wong's wildly sexy niece Maggie (Maggie Q), both of whom also have a dark history with Feng. All roads lead to Feng's mysterious jungle compound and the most unique Ping-Pong tournaments ever staged. There, Randy faces such formidable players as his long-ago Olympics opponent, the still-vicious Karl Wolfschtagg (Thomas Lennon). Can Randy keep his eye on the ball? Will he achieve the redemption he craves?

Overall Impressions:
Well of course he will. The only film I can think of where the hero doesn't win is Rocky & even they *sarcasm* "fixed" it in the sequel. Anyway, back to the current topic. The story is pretty much an out and out spoof of Enter the Dragon, with some James Bond, Scarface and some clichéd martial arts film thrown in. Unfortunately it leaves you with more smiles and chuckles than laughs. IMDB gives this 5/10, which seems a little harsh, but is probably about right.

Dan Fogler does an okay job here but he was better in Good Luck Chuck, the part here just feels very much as though it was written for Jack Black, it has that whole School of Rock thing going on, with the Def Leppard fan at the realm with a paddle. Maggie Q looks very pretty and kicks some ass while she's around. Christopher Walken does that whole talking thing, which is always a charm. The show stealer is probably James Hong as the blind master though, as he's the one providing most of the chuckles.

Dan in Real Life'

Plot Outline:
Dan Burns (Steve Carell) is a devoted single father and a renowned newspaper advice columnist. When his entire extended family gets together for a reunion he unexpectedly meets Marie (Juliette Binoche), the woman of his dreams. She is smart, funny, beautiful and she just happens to be his brother's girlfriend! In this heartfelt new comedy, the man with all the answers finds that the hardest advice to take may be your own.

Overall Impressions:
Its concept is pretty generic, we've seen this sort of film upteen times, boy meets girl, girl has a boyfriend, boy goes ouch. Boy connivingly removes obstacle remains painfully in love until girl realises boy is the catch & not the current boyfriend. Spicing this up a bit, add a connection between the boy and current boyfriend. Aha .. brothers! Mockery aside, have you ever wondered why we've seen this concept upteen times? I'll skip the in-depth structural analysis of plot and say it plain out: "because it works!"

So we have a story that works, we have a bunch of talents, but there's still 100 odd things they could get wrong. I'm glad to report, this time is not one of those cases. When we have a story that has been tried and tested numerous times before, what is crucial for such a film to hold an impact, is a whiff of freshness and this is a stronger point of Dan. Focussing initially on the dysfunctional father angle and merely skimming over his career as someone who advises others thorugh his column, it hits off with a strong beginning. With only one of his 3 daughters who remains close to him, he becomes someone who you can empathise with straight away.

As they set off to an annual larger family gathering, we get to find out more about him, his extended family do love him and are happy to see him, but even they think he sucks. To quite an extent he trusts that his family knows him well, he too believes this. He's not wallowing in self-pity to the point where he irritates, but he's come to terms with the idea that he must try a lot harder than the average man to achieve the norm. Not that we had any doubts, but funny-man Steve Carell gives us an honest, normal person to relate to & it's at this point that the conflict hits home.

As he meets this girl who mistakes him for an employee at a book store, it doesn't feel like an awkward turn, which I feel it easily would have if it wasn't for the leadup to it and the way it's handled on-screen. Since the story is pretty straightforward and simple, I think I should leave going further about the plot by saying the film is worth seeing for the product as a whole. A well-grounded, well-written, all round well balanced flick.

Hitman'

Plot Outline:
A gun-for-hire known only as Agent 47 (Timothy Olyphant) is ensnared in a political conspiracy, which finds him pursued by both Interpol and the Russian FSB (The successor of the KGB).When one of his assassinations is botched, 47 sets out to find out who set him up. Along the way he encounters numerous other hitmen assigned to take him out.

Overall Impressions:
Being a fan of films about assasins, it seems a little strange that I've never played the games that this film is based on, alas it is the truth & so I have no comparisons to make and am simple perceiving this as the film that it is. A film that appeared by most of the news surrounding it (and to an extent the trailer) to be a horrid mess.

As a pleasant surprise it's not. The concept is pretty simple and even so there are loopholes almost as large as me, but even factoring these in, there is no denying that it holds up as an above average entertainer. The character is ultra-cool and Timothy Olyphant does a good job of keeping it that way. A lot of people I know have been telling me he doesn't look the part, but this for me was a non-issue. Whether it be that I didn't know the character well enough to judge is another story.

Another surprise was that in a film centred upon the main lead role of Agent 47, a couple of others also leave an impact too. Firstly, (Dougray Scott) the interpol agent who has been tracking Agent 47 for years now. He is like the one agent who tracked the Incredible Hulk in the TV Series, totoally a believer and he knows how the man thinks, only ever one step behind. I think there was much scope for developing this aspect further. Secondly the character of Olga Kurylenko, in honesty this was one of my main concerns surrounding this flick originally: the potential 'love interest'. By my books, assasins and love interests don't mix. I'm glad to report this factor has been handled neatly. There is chemistry there but it's only pursued subtly, it happens to also add a dry humour about the flick.

The action is as expected pretty fast-paced, there were even occasions where they blatantly prioritised the 'looking cool' over logically choosing an optimal fighting strategy, but I totally approve. It kept things interesting & looking cool. I guess this is where the 'game' factor also comes in. Though I'm not certain, I imagine that in the games too you would have this option of choosing an optimal, discreet way of handling certain situations or alternatively going in guns blazing, just for fun.

One standout sore-point would definitely have to be dialogue. Not all through -- just at certain points the dialogue just went into retard-mode. The sort of dialogue that made you wonder if the film was based on that text-based game Zork rather than a modern day game about Assasins.

30 Days of Night

Plot Outline
For 30 days every winter, the isolated town of Barrow, Alaska is plunged into a state of complete darkness. It's a bitter time when most of the inhabitants head south. This winter, a mysterious group of strangers appear: bloodthirsty vampires, ready to take advantage of the uninterrupted darkness to feed on the residents remaining in town. Barrow's Sheriff Eben (Josh Hartnett), his estranged wife Stella (Melissa George), and an ever-shrinking group of survivors must do anything they can to last until daylight.

Review
A stranger is seen in town (Ben Foster) in conjunction with a number of strange cases of vandalism/attacks as the town prepares for it's 30 days of darkness. The setup is perfect. They clearly make you feel that things are going to be going wrong here, big-time. Though Ben Foster has little screen-time, in these initial scenes he flawlessly adds to the sense of intimidation. He knows something that explains the strange occurences around town, but he doesn't spell it out, only hints at it. "They're coming!"

As expected of a film of this genre it has the key characters defined early on, the main couple with a conflict in their back story, other key individuals, relatives, families, some of which will become prey, some not, and it's up to you to guess who. Thankfully they don't spend too much time messing around once the setup is complete. Time to watch as the bloodbath ensues. People start getting slaughtered as the vampires are revealed. Defnitely another big win for the film. These are mean looking vamps. Gone are the days of dodgy morphs and painted faces, the effects fit the genre to the tee. I personally also liked that they didn't speak English. It made them more, believable.

From here the ride is pretty constant up to the pre-climax. Is this good? Well, yes and no. The plus side is that the action keeps you engaged, consistently, with intimidation, people turned to vamps, vamp to dust, beheadings, the usual stuff you'd expect from a decent vampire flick. The good stuff.

On the flipside, there isn't much there to suggest that days are passing by. Josh gets stubble, but not much else changes. An in-depth progression of time may be much to expect from a film like this, but with a title like this, I'd have expected that they put in something, unfortunately, we only get a caption 3 or 4 times in the film telling you what day it is. Before you know it, day 30 has arrived, and this is where it gets interesting (and not in a good way).

If you were to compare the good times you have when 'drinking and merry' with 'the aftermath' or worse the situation where you're not careful, leading to 'projectile reverse of swallowing', well that's precisely how I felt about the film upto this point compared to its last 10 minutes. Everything was going so well. Since I intend to keep this spoiler-free, my sentiments are simply 'why-oh-why did you do that??' My own possible justifications were, perhaps to add more drama to the 30th day? To remain true to the graphic novel? Just for fun? I couldn't say for sure, but if they had to incorporate it, I think it was crucial that they had some setup for those final events. It seemed a little far fetched (okay I can let that slip, since it's a film about vampires after all) but also too sudden. Even films with a good twist have some setup, something to look back at and think, ah that makes sense. Here there is none.

Overall, if the last 10 minutes were removed from memory (which is really unfortunate that I can't) I would have recommended it as a top-class vampire film, with some good characterisation and numerous humerous kills (human and vampire alike). Alas, at my current standing, I'll say its a pungent disappointing after-taste sticking with you after an otherwise good meal.

Black Sheep

Plot Outline
Terrified of sheep and dosed up on therapy, Henry Oldfield (Nathan Meister) returns to his family's farm to sell out to his elder brother Angus (Peter Feeney), unaware that something baaaad is going on: Angus' reckless genetic engineering program.

When a pair of inept environmental activists release a mutant lamb from the laboratory onto the farm, thousands of sheep are turned into bloodthirsty predators. Along with farmhand (Tammy Davis) and greenie girl Experience (Danielle Mason), Henry finds himself stranded deep on the farm as his worst nightmare comes to life.

Review
It's no big secret that I don't 'like' horrors, but when they take the comedy angle, it makes suspending your belief far easier, this way I'm usually quite entertained. This specific venture definitely falls under that category & it's obvious they had good fun making this. That said, it seemed to me like it wasn't quite enough. Something felt missing.

There are numerous fun moments, and it does exactly what it says on the tin yet somehow I found myself more indifferent about the film afterwards rather than loving or hating it. A possible reason is the character's just weren't all that interesting and it takes a while for the sheep to end their silence. I mean the second-level characters were to become sheep-food or sheep-zombies but the central character didn't have much depth either. I call it a possible reason because, the genre (if you could call it that) doesn't necessarily need it.

Overall, though I can't pinpoint the exact reasons, it's all I expected but nothing more. A cult film for sure, but outside of that nothing special.

American Gangster

Plot Outline
In 1970s America, nobody used to notice Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington) , the quiet driver to one of the city's leading black crime bosses. But when his boss suddenly dies, Frank exploits the opening in the power structure to build his own empire and create his own version of the American Dream. Through ingenuity and a strict business ethic, he comes to rule the inner-city drug trade, flooding the streets with a purer product at a better price. Lucas outplays all of the crime syndicates and becomes not only one of the city's mainline corruptors, but part of it's circle of legit civic superstars.

Richie Roberts (Russel Crowe) is an outcast cop close enough to the streets to feel a shift of control in the drug underworld. Roberts believes someone is climbing he rungs above the known Mafia families and starts to suspect that a black power has come from nowhere to dominate the scene.

Both Lucas and Roberts share a rigorous ethical code that sets them apart from their own colleagues, making them lone figures on opposite sides of the law. The destinies of these two men will become intertwined as they approach a confrontation where only one of them can come out on top.

Review
Based on a true story, the main focus of the film is that it is set in a time where being black and being in power were not things that the people had come to see as mutually feasible. In such a setting who better to define this rising power other than Denzel? I mean, "everybody loves Denzel".

On the flip side, I feared this may have it's toll. Since Denzel has a larger-than-life persona with a knack for looking cool, even when he's doing the more nastier of things (Man on Fire, Training Day), I felt this may become an issue, as it may make the distribution of drugs look cool, which really just shouldn't happen, on or off screen.

Thankfully, the parts about the actual street dealing is kept low-key as far as his character development is concerned and though we are informed of the blue magic brand hitting the streets, with numerous victims of addiction and their tragic consequences, we see Frank quite distanced from it all. His approach to the business is no different than it would be for any other legal product. Getting a name through better quality and at a lower price. To him it was merely an opportunity to be exploited, a highly lucrative one at that.

On the other side of the law we have the character of Richie Roberts who is much reminiscent of the super cops portrayed in Hindi films of the 80's. The one man in a corrupt system that has more enemies than allies on both sides of the law, he is not to be messed with and can not be bought. He is a straight cop that has a passion for what his job is supposed to be - justice. Naturally, a man of such passion has a terrible family life.

Russell Crowe eases into the role like fish to water, underplaying his part in just the right amounts. Admittedly I'm not a fan, but I can't fault him here. He gets into the skin of the character and will surely get applauded for it.

So, with Ridley Scott in the driving seat & the characters both in play how does it all unfold? I'd love to say flawlessly but that's be stretching it just a little. Don't get me wrong, it moves pretty damned well, but it does leave a bit of room for improvement.

Being a total outsider to the facts, picking holes seems a little unfair, but even so I'll say it seemed as though they may have over-dramatised some of the on-goings to fit within the span of Frank's career. I felt they really didn't need to do this.

In particular it stands out that Frank Lucas is made out to be the first black American Gangster, except he blatantly wasn't. His boss before his untimely demise too was black and from the same trade. If approached smartly, a little more detail about him, his mistakes & Frank learning from this could have left more of an impact (in flashbacks perhaps). Currently standing it seemed as though Frank was progressing totally off his own back.

This came across a little inspired by the iconic Godfather figure, backing up this theory there is also much emphasis on the business remaining within the family. Of-course, this isn't so far fetched, keeping it in the household helps, as there is less scope for betrayals (in theory), but re-iterating my above point, if they showed that this was one of the improvements he made to his predecessor, this could have been more interesting.

Putting this aside, the progress of the gangster, running in parallel to the lone team of Richie Roberts and his small posse of investigators is impressively integrated. You can relate to both sides of the law progressing in their motives concurrently, without feeling a jump in narrative from one side to the other.

What also came as a pleasant surprise was that the long duration of the film didn't seem 'too' long. The film is paced well and leads up to a resolution which is highly satisfying. A good example of truth being stranger than fiction.

Following the relationships of Frank with his family, his business contacts, his enemies, it all shows good business-sense, flourish and progress. Something I thought felt quite real was that not all of these angles that we get exposed to have full resolutions, in fact some have none.

As an example: his nephew who wanted to become a sportsman his entire life, is given the opportunity to join the big leagues due to Frank's influential stature, but having seen Frank's success and riches, he decides he too wants just this. It's brought up in conversation at a family gathering & you can see Frank concerned, but it's left there. No further discussion or actions.

The story is about Frank and set within a certain time frame. There is no way everything in this timeframe would be tied up nice and neat. Keeping this sort of reality in the narrative is amongst its strengths. The largest strength to myself, as I mentioned earlier was that resolution to the story is refreshing and again, comes across as interesting and believable.

Overall, I found that the strengths heavily outweigh the minor blemishes that I've pointed at. With powerful performances by the Academy award winners in their principal roles, as well as the remainder of the cast playing their integral bit-parts that move the story forward, I'd put this up there as one of this year's better films. A must watch when it releases nation-wide in November.

Waitress'

Plot Outline:
Jenna is unhappily married, squirreling away money, and hoping to win a pie-baking contest so, with the prize money, she'll have enough cash to leave her husband Earl. She finds herself pregnant, which throws her plans awry. She bakes phenomenal pies at Joe's diner, listens to old Joe's wisdom, tolerates her sour boss Cal, is friends with Dawn and Becky (her fellow waitresses), and finds a mutual attraction with the new doctor in town. As the pregnancy advances, life with Earl seems less tolerable, a way out less clear, and the affair with the doctor complicated by his marriage. What options does a waitress have?

Review:
Jenna (Keri Russell) bakes up a newly invented pie every single day. Her brilliance is truly appreciated by anyone that tastes them. Anyone except her good-for-nothing self-absorbed husband Earl (Jeremy Sisto). Their marriage is a total disaster. She is merely an object of possession to him, one that he holds with a tight grip. When she requests to enter a pie contest that could win them $25,000 and where she could get some real exposure for her talent, he denies this opportunity to her.

The only solace that Jenna has in this miserable day-to-day routine is her newly invented daily pie and her quirky but supportive colleagues Becky (Cheryl Hines) & Dawn (Adrienne Shelly -- the writer/director). When Jenna finds herself to be pregnant, (due to her husband getting her drunk and well, you know), things are to take a turn in her life, conveniently at this juncture, in comes waltzing the new doctor in town (Nathan Fillion). If you're already putting two and two together you'll probably come up with a total of five.

Wrongly pegged as a romantic comedy, this film is primarily about the journey of a pregnant woman. From the day one: "I don't want no baby. I don't want no trouble. I just want to make pies." to the very end, it's about Jenna and the pregnancy. It has a message to put across with regards to the pressures that being pregnant can have on a woman, thankfully though, this is not done at the expense of taking away entertainment value from the viewer.

The thing that's initially noticeable about Waitress is the folksy language. No bad thing, but it does take a little getting used to. Helping along the way is the quirky dialogue and humour. As the plot progresses, the marriage situation is revealed to be worse than we first thought, you do actually find hate for the character of Earl with no effort at all. Again it's the strange humour that helps you feel at ease, through the otherwise uncomfortable situations we see her go through.

We also get more familiar with the allies she has outside of home. The friendly doctor is everything for her that Earl is not. The colleagues have their own little issues and tantrums from which Jenna can learn a thing or two, it's all very smartly written. It should be said it's the brilliant writing by Adrienne Shelly that makes the balance work so well. In addition the humour seems straight out of life. Each character seems to have their own set of strange behaviours that works together with that of the others, to form the unique humour. I think this is true to reality, with the strange factor amplified a little.

Ofcourse great writing has to be enhanced by the performances and as intended they are all-round are appropriately quirky. I was initially drawn to this film because Nathan Fillion is in it. He's pretty cool and I was interested to see what he's up to these days. Post-Serenity he seems to be a little dormant. He does a top-notch job as the doc and I'm not disappointed. That said, without a shred of doubt maximum praise has to go to Keri Russell for taking the role of Jenna and really making it her own, the remainder of the cast are not far behind. The only person I would pinpoint as slightly uneasy at certain points is Jeremy Sisto. It felt at times he was struggling playing this total jerk & wanted to burst into laughter at how ridiculous the character was. I don't blame him.

Overall, Waitress holds that unique independent film fragrance and can quite easily be compared to the numerous bitter and sweet pies that it bakes up over its 104 minute duration. You'll probably walk away uplifted somewhat and most certainly craving pie. I'll leave you with just that.

Some of the pies featured in the film:
"I don't want Earl's baby pie"
Quiche of egg and brie cheese with a smoked ham centre.

"Kick in the pants pie"
Cinnamon spice custard.

"I hate my husband pie"
You take bittersweet chocolate and don't sweeten it. You make it into a pudding and drown in caramel.

"Baby screaming it's head off in the middle of the night and ruining my life pie"
Pecans and nutmeg over a New York style cheesecake. No crust ..

"Earl murders me because I'm having an affair pie"
You smash blackberries and raspberries into a chocolate crust.

"I can't have no affair because it's wrong and I don't want Earl to kill me pie"
Vanilla custard with banana, hold the banana ..

"Pregnant miserable self-pitying loser pie"
Lumpy oatmeal with fruitcake mashed in. Flambe' ofcourse ...

Every place I read about Waitress I find they use the word slice at least once so here goes:
Thanks to Filmstalker for sending me out there to experience this delicious slice of life. :-) You'll find this review mirrored over there too.

Hallam Foe

Plot Outline:
Based on the novel by Peter Jinks, Hallam Foe is a story about a 17-year-old misfit (Jamie Bell).

Hallam's talent for spying on people reveals his darkest fears - and his most peculiar desires. Driven to expose the true cause of his mother's death, he instead finds himself searching the rooftops of the city for love.

Hallam Foe is a boy haunted by the enigma of his mother's death. Did she drown herself, or was she pushed? Hallam has evidence which he believes implicates Verity (Claire Forlani) his alluring, feline step-mother. Yet his own methods for uncovering secrets are no less devious. From his treetop hideout, or sneaking through his father's decasing Scottish mansion, Hallam spies on people. Most of all he spies on Verity, and the more he becomes obsessed with her guilt, the more his attraction to her grows. When Verity confronts him, Hallam is helpless to resist her seductive power. his only resort is to flee the family nest.

Alone and penniless, Hallam leaves the Scottish Highlands and crashes down into reality. But as he wanders the unforgiving streets of Edinburgh, he discovers another use for his peculiar skill. Catching a glimpse of Kate (Sophia Myles), a young woman who looks uncannily like his mother, he follows her back to the hotel where she works, and talks his way into a job. Life begins to look up for Hallam. By day he discovers friends amongst social outcasts, and by night he does what he loves best - clambering over the city roofs, spying on people in all their hilarious strangeness. The city is a realm of glimmering allure, and Hallam is it's freaky spiderman.

Exploring the high-clock of the hotel, he finds a new hideaway from where he can watch Kate at home in her rooftop apartment, gazing through her window with his binoculars. But Hallam's bittersweet visions are shattered when he discovers Kate is embroiled in a seedy liasion with the hotel manager. What happens from here, forms the crux of the story.

Prologue:
Before beginning, many thanks go to Stephen Naughton (from Beatwax) for inviting Filmstalker to this advanced screening of Hallam Foe in London. Firstly I should probably mention this is based on a book I haven't read, and so naturally I'll be making no comparison. My perception here is entirely upon the film put in front of me, and you all know how much I love it when that happens. So here goes ..

Review:
As we are introduced to Hallam as he pervs upon a couple with a pair of binoculars from his tree-house, we are thrown straight into his strange little world. It takes a little while to get used to the principal character and his quirks, his hunchback walk and introverted personality seem too weird to be the 'hero', after all, the main character needs to be someone you can relate to and initially this doesn't quite seem the case, but this is no bad thing.

We familiarise ourselves first with his actions, and as the plot develops, we get to grips with the thought behind it and the way he thinks. It burns down to his defences, the way he is socially quite inept. His means of social endeavour is to watch from afar, before taking any such risk as to communicate with people. A lot of the time he is simply satisfied with watching.

Though initially his actions may come off as intrusive, disrespectful of privacy and all-round devious, we soon get to see the innocence of it all. His actions are more akin to a child not familiar with an object and prodding it with a stick. Convincing the audience of this is where I would say this film scores well.

As far as character development for the remainder of the characters is concerened, they are a little too vague, Hallam seems to have got all the attention, which keeps the focus on him, however this makes the actions of others difficult to digest at times. In particular, Kate (Sophia Myles) seemed to suffer from this most. As a distraction, she is beautiful and acts the part very well, but this doesn't fix the issue that the way she reacts to Hallam's actions seem too devoid of realistic doubt and suspicion. How much of this was in the hands of the film-makers, (bearing in mind is a novel adaptation) is difficult to tell, but it does stand out.

So the writing has its share of positives and negatives, some of which may have been unavoidable, putting this aside and moving on to the visuals of the film. Here I can safely say the work done is optimal, it didn't jump out at me straight away, but once Hallam shifts to the city, we see the contrast between the scenery straight away, in addition the director manages find a good balance between capturing the beauty of the city as well as the more hostile and intimidating environment that a stranger might find themselves in.

As we start following him around rooftops, the camera work does a great job of making it appear that he has no problems getting around up there, and also a shocking view of how high up he actually is. As the viewer we get to see with him downwards to the possible fall, if he were to slip up.

The multiple times that Hallam is hanging outside Kate's loft window, fits the familiarity that we've learnt about Hallam's watching habits and it doesn't jump out as abnormal by this point, (though I feel it may read that way). What is interesting is how each instance that we see him there is a different situation, some quite comic I might add. The dialogue throughout adds a layer of humour that has been carefully weaved into the scenes too. This is a definite huge plus on the writing side. Some of the witty jokes remain most memorable after the show is over.

The character of Hallam is definitely the most intense of the lot and Jamie Bell has done a great job bringing that to life. There is no disputing, he's the star of the show, but credit should certainly also be given to the remainder of the cast for working around him so well. The character of Raymond (Maurice Roeves) as Hallam's fellow colleague in the hotel kitchen is certainly worth a special mention. He adds a level of humour to the ongoings, ensuring the viewer isn't feeling too untoward when the plot is getting heavy. Ewen Bremner gets a similar function later on, as Hallam gets transitioned to a better job.

So by the end of the film we expect some kind of resolution for a number of situations that have been put before us. I'm not really sure what I expected at this point, but what I got was not entirely satisfactory. The situation with Kate is resolved spot on, based on what little we've learnt about her this seems entirely feasible. However going back to the reasons he has run away from home, the resolution seemed to be somewhat forced dramatic. I won't go and ruin it for you, and though the end outcome of the events is appropriate and fitting, it seems they felt it lacked drama and then pumped it through with some. This part may just be me though.

Overall conclusions, It's a well made film, even with the small shortcomings, the character of Hallam is interesting, the performances are top-notch, the direction is spot on, the camera work is appropriately fitting, even the background music is very good, yet it seems to lack something in its overall appeal. If I were to take a wild stab in the dark to suggest what that might be, I'll say that I think it's just not a subject that everybody will be interested in or comfortable with. My advice if you're in two minds about watching this, would be to read over the synopsis and watch it if what you read catches your fancy.

Well, that's my two and a half cents on the film, but wait there's more:
Following the screening there was a Q&A session with Director (David McKenzie), and stars (Jamie Bell and Sophia Myles). Okay though it started as a Q&A session, but it soon was more like a bit of a chat between the press audience and the presenters, most of the questions were vague and answers likewise, but I did make some notes and I'll cover what I learnt.

Q. (to David) - Why did you want to make 'this' movie?
A. Principally because the character of Hallam was interesting, an outcast, weird and following the process of rehabilitating him.

Q. (to Jamie) - What was the hardest part of playing this character?
A. Getting to grips with the first few pages of the script. He's arrogant, a posh bastard, a pervert, disrespectful to his elders. Why would we like him? Answering the question, I guess approaching the character, getting to like him was initially hard. I learn though that coming to terms with a loss of a parent would be tough, I guess it can result in putting lipstick around your nipples.

Q. (to Sophie) - How did you get the part?
A. I read the script and was familiar with David's work. I practically begged him to give me the part, I wrote him a card and a letter.
A. (David takes over) .. I wouldn't say begged, we met up, had a coffee, talked over the script, but you do this kind of thing all the time, it can get rather de-personalised, I think it was nice that she then followed it up with a nice letter saying she really liked the script and would like to do it.

Q. (to David) The relationship between Kate and Hallam was quite ambiguous. Was it intended this way?
A. Well yea, the film spans over 3 weeks, we wanted to be realistic about it.

Q. (to All) The internet has become a tool for yourselves to work with the civilian audiences, has this made things easier or harder as a process?
A. (Sophia) Well the first shock I had was identity fraud, I tried setting up a myspace account only to find there already is one, with a picture of me and it even states that "I like creepy guys", taken straight from this film. -- I asked her personally later and she wants to clarify that she doesn't actually like creepy guys :)
A. (Jamie) It's great, imdb is practically your resume avaialble to anyone anywhere, myspace, ipod trailers, it's what its all about, I mean 'fuck billboards', if you want someone to know about what you're selling, put it on your myspace frontpage and a million people can see it instantly.

Following Q&A there were snack and drinks, where we all mingled and discussed, likes and dislikes in films, the weather, the internet and well the atmosphere was very down to earth. This really did surprise me, I expected them to be more stuck up if I'm honest. Lastly but certainly not least I'd like to say thanks to Richard for putting myself forward as a fellow Filmstalker representative at this elite preview screening. It was a great evening. I even got my picture taken with Jamie Bell :)