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John Lynch plays
Best (15) 95 mins is it
Football films rarely score and this Cinematic View of George Best hits the post and trundles along the line before being booted to safety. In other cliched words, director Mary McGuckian's effort is so near, yet so far. John Lynch (McGuckian's husband) plays the wayward superstar who attained footie god status almost overnight by helping Manchester United to European glory before becoming hell-bent in blowmg it all jUSl as SWiftly.
The film kicks off where it ends, With the death of the club’s legendary boss, Matt Busby flan Banneni. Desperately hungover, Best is informed of his mentor's death by his chum, the equally-mercurial Rodney Marsh (Roger Daltrey). From there we enter
the man Best in another failed footie flick
traditional flashback territory as Georgie recalls the hazy days of being brOught over from Belfast to Manchester as a precocious player to his award as European Footballer Of The Year, and on to being pushed out of Old Trafford by Tommy Docherty.
Best’s failings are plenty; the almost obsessive desire to give the film a late 60s/early 70s aesthetic leads to unnecessary camera pyrotechnics pushing it into massively inferior Performance territory. Plus, the self- disgust gets wearing by the time Bestie is hiding from the police in his Chelsea pad. Still, full marks go to the majority of cast; in particular, Ian Hart’s bitter Nobby Stiles, Linus Roache’s spot-on Denis Law and Jerome Flynn’s Bobby Charlton comb-over. (Brian Donaldson) I Selected release from Fri 72 May.
Prime material for Sunday evening television
My Life So Far (12) 98 mins * it
Everything in Hugh Hudson’s film is about to change. Robert Norman's Fraser Pettigrew is about to go from childhood innocence to sexualised adolescence. The Scottish estate of the elderly matriarch Gamma (Rosemary Harris) is about to be passed onto a new generation, either her go-ahead capitalist son (Malcolm McDowell) or her dithering romantic nephew Edward (Colin Firth). Genteel affluence is about to give way to wartime hardship After a botched attempt at adultery, Edward is about to mature into a sedate middle age.
Loosely based on the memoirs of Sir Denis Forman, now a televrsion executive, My Life .So Far would love to
30 THE LIST ll 25 May 2000
be a play by Anton Chekhov. It is instead a mushy piece of whimsy, a nostalgic portrait of a world where the landed classes are eccentric buffoons, the lower orders are credulous na'ifs and life in a country seat is just fine and dandy. It's prime material, in short, for Sunday evening television, though probably too bland even for that.
True to form, writer Simon Donald IHJGClS the script With a certain edge, wryly sending up the characters and working up a funny scene in which the young Fraser silences the room with a misguided remark about prostitution, but he’s working wrth material that is fundamentally reactionary and what he can’t do is make us feel that any of it should matter. (Mark Fisher)
I Selected release from Fri 72 May See preview
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The Adventures Of Elmo In Grouchland (U) 72 mins 1an
We’ve seen his red pelt strapped to the backs of dizzy students everywhere and witnessed gurgling infants scream in terror as his life-size replica giggles and chats to them in toyshops across the land. Now Elmo is set to conquer the silver screen. Well, not quite. The pre-school, educational appeal of Sesame Street's cute stalwart doesn’t really transfer to cinema as well as his spiritual cousins, The Muppets. Despite sturdy support from all the Slit-'2' a i lain, Oscar,
Strictly for the littlest family members
Cookie Monster, Bert and Ernie, this is strictly for thi- 211es' " 1*. and, unlike many more knowing kids films today, this s a =i-ie ' at; l‘tiltl the interest of most over fives.
Elmo loses his security blanket down Oscar the Gun." " i" t); :nszde, he is transported to the hellish Grouchland, i‘t- ~ 'i’tr .: i")lll the hands of Grouchland's most abhorrent resident l-i-at :> : :i, l‘rlll'dklll So, Elmo starts On an adventure to retrieve his '~ ~: : but not before his friends rally round and assist him on hrs ()LHM'.
Sure there’s singing, dancing, gentle fun and tilt- (TlTl t: :‘u v. " *' : e, iititi lll() isn’t going to worry Toy Story 2 when it (()l“.i"S tn :‘ i- ' appeal.
(Mark Robertson) I General release from Fri 79 May
Final Destination (15) 98 mins *1: * After a premonition, Alex (Devon Sawa) manages to save a bunch of his classmates from a plane crash. Yet, as one by one the survivors gruesomely pop their clogs, it becomes apparent that death is playing catch-up. Thankfully, director James Wong (of TV’s The X-Fi/es) avoids any Scream- style self-consciousness. Instead, he creates a meticulous build up of cliches that are then turned on their head. The result IS a tense supernatural slasher film that’ll leave you rigid in your cinema seat, or cowering in the lap of the person in front.
Tense supernatural slasher
However, fear is not the only cringe factor, the : ' t or 3:7 and unintentional ’naffness’ Is a very thin one Attend)". ' . ‘. '_ 1 ":rr oe'iie seem haphazard, leading to a tone whit h is uric-zen ‘t- . . : ti ‘sil he said of the complexions of the cast which, by rece' : Ht \7 . . ' , runs: he the least attractive collection of Aii'iericaii tet‘-".ai:~~' v- " ~ 1‘. i% .'"i( ii, although that’s little diver5ion from the typic all: s . ' ' :aii‘ati,
Still, none of this really matters, It makes the kits ; i’r " l. : :wanie and, ultimately, the pace, irreverence and sick, hlae ' v .' -. ~ riiost
entertaining teen slasher since the original St ream I General release from Fri 79 May. Hanging Up (15) 94 minutes it ‘A' On paper, this comedy-drama looks mouth-watering. It stars Meg Ryan, Lisa Kudrow, Walter Matthau and Diane Keaton, was directed by the latter and written by Nora and Delia Ephron, the women behind Sleepless In Seattle and You’ve Got Mail. So, what went so horribly wrong? '- The story sees three sisters reunited by the failing health of their father (Matthau). However, tempers fray as middle sister Eve (Ryan), resents havmg to (tl'i' 'u ' ~ ~ ‘. ..i‘i;-.-' Maddy (Kudrow) and big sister, Georgia (Keaton, {1' '-r ' ' i at: livi' undates while getting on with their careers.
Not the happiest of families
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Keaton‘s film aims to show how tensions huh-l: (‘ : i ft ' exert the happiest of families, but It's difficult to find :i' . ' E.- '.‘ lady or Georgia as they moan about their successful, giaizimet.. .w a : kniteii's direction had been a bit bleaker w everything is (trim. t'i ' ' - ' : -. writ‘a'iis or the Ephrons' script a bit sharper then it mould t- 2- ‘. :'i‘ inn-at saih insurm0untable obstacles as car IllStll'dfltt‘ and sit: ilt‘Ll's I'u- . v~ l rivat is the ever-watchable Matthau, who gets the oril, laiiril‘ :' L\.'\t‘ attzitii
the size of John Wayne’s manhood. (Simon Pltit kinse I General release from Fri 72 May.