A no-hoper slacker sees beyond his beer belly long enough to try and win back a lost love, and a murder is solved when seen from different perspectives.
> Run Fat Boy Run
Director: David Schwimmer
Starring: Simon Pegg, Thandie Newton, Hank Azaria, Harish Patel, Dylan Moran, Simon Day Stephen Merchant, David Walliams
Rating: (M)
4 stars (out of 5)
Review by Christine Powley
We tend to think of the people who market films as diabolical geniuses, always coming up with scams to con us into seeing lousy movies. Yet there are plenty of films for which the marketing leaves you amazed at its incompetence.
I am thinking of the flyer for Run Fat Boy Run (Rialto and Hoyts), which is so off beam that it just had to be written by someone who has not seen it. I read the flyer and was turned off because the lead character Dennis (Simon Pegg) sounded a real tool.
I watched Run Fat Boy Run anyway and it was so much better than portrayed. Dennis, a commitment-phobic who ran out on his pregnant girlfriend Libby (Thandie Newton), is not a hard act to follow, but the guy has more heart than his slobby exterior suggests.
Pegg, who also had a hand in writing this, is a dab hand at making slacker males sympathetic. Dennis chain-smokes; he carries a beer gut that had me wondering if prosthetics were involved and he is fully aware that running away from Libby was the dumbest thing he ever did. As messed up as he is, he is impossible to dislike.
To add to Dennis' funk, Libby has a smarmy new boyfriend, Whit (Hank Azaria). Whit runs marathons and, in a misguided effort to impress Libby, Dennis declares that he will compete in the marathon that Whit is doing in three weeks time.
Libby is not interested but Dennis' best mate Gordon (Dylan Moran) and his landlord Mr Ghoshdashtidar (Harish Patel) decide that since he is finally making an effort, they will act as his trainers.
The next three weeks progress in exactly the same way as any other sporting movie but Run Fat Boy Run does not belabour the point too much. We all know it is ridiculous and we all like Dennis enough to want him to succeed.
Low-key and droll, Run Fat Boy Run is perfect if you love British comedies in which old ladies say bad words.
> Vantage Point
Director: Pete Travis
Starring: Sigourney Weaver, Dennis Quaid, Forest Whitaker, Matthew Fox, William Hurt, Edgar Ramirez, Ayelet Zurer
Rating: (M)
3 stars (out of 5)
Review by Mark Orton
Aside from the obvious examples of Quentin Tarantino and Wes Anderson, Hollywood so often forgoes non-mainstream cinematic techniques. So it's refreshing to discover a contemporary film like Vantage Point using a clever narrative device adapted from Akira Kurosawa's 1950 classic, Rashomon.
The device involves re-telling a moment in time from a variety of perspectives.
Vantage Point is set in Seville and terrorism is the theme. United States President Ashton (William Hurt) is due to address a summit at an outdoor event when he is suddenly gunned down.
Monitoring the whole event from behind a bank of monitors is the faux-CNN (GNN) team headed by steely news producer Rex Brooks (Sigourney Weaver).
Cut to take number two. Cue flashback and we are instantly transported to the world of troubled secret service agent Thomas Barnes (Dennis Quaid). Barnes is pivotal to the hunt for a suspected hit-man when he uncovers clues in footage captured on Howard Lewis' (Forest Whitaker) video camera, and so it goes. Crucial details in the whodunit are drip-fed.
Unlike Rashomon, where subjectivity is critiqued, Vantage Point supposedly gives an objective reality based on the third party perspective of each character caught in the elaborate plot.
Sound confusing? Vantage Point could have so easily fallen over, but somehow doesn't. Plaudits must be given to the team of editors who have crafted classy cinematography into a triumph of pacing and orientation.
If only the same level of attention was paid to the storyline. Vantage Point is all style and little substance. American imperialism triumphs once again. Dark-skinned Spaniards are terrorists, the president is misunderstood, and the hero of the day is a white middle-aged guy.
For almost 85 minutes, Vantage Point is an exhilarating ride as the exciting climax is executed with precision. If it wasn't for a few disturbing moments of cliched sentiment, the rating would have been stronger.
