Hey folks, Harry here with metalmicky with a look at ABOUT A BOY that went down up in Toronto last night. Folks, I got a ton of tiny little two liners about this film last night all of which were praising Hugh Grant's latest comedy. So it looks like this may actually be a really good little lite comedy. Here's metalmicky with the rundown!
Hi there Harry…you can call me metalmicky, if you’re looking for a name.
I got to see About a Boy last night, here in Toronto, for what I understand was the first North American screening, as we were told.
The audience was mostly full, and people laughed out loud at more than one moment. All things considered, I would say that the average moviegoer liked it…but here’s my review, if you’d like.
Hugh Grant plays a man who buys stuff and gets his hair done. He seduces and leaves a huge stream of women. In any other circumstance, he would be considered a total cad, and women would hate him. He is the jerk your mother warned you about, the guy who grabbed your best friend's ass in the kitchen at your last dinner party, the man who looks you up and down in a bar and then decides that your hips are too big even though you are clearly the coolest girl in the joint he told you that your eyes sparkle like stars. He's a British Jerry Seinfeld, really: late 30s, won't grow up, tall, thin and neat but not gay, has a lot of free time, great pad in one of the world's most expensive cities, and breaks up with women for no reason at all other than his own neuroses. He has the commitment skills of a strobe light. Still, he narrates the movie and he is played by Hugh Grant, so we know he is a good guy, even there are no indications as such. He has a nice apartment.
He is funny, though, and dresses pretty well. We know that he will redeem himself soon, because he is the hero of the story. He meets a weird kid with a bowl cut whose mother tries to commit suicide. She seems to undergo no counseling upon her release, after one night, from a hospital, child welfare never steps in to check in on a 12 year old with a suicidal mother (proving that English hospitals are a lot like HMOs), and the kid starts spending more and more time at Hugh Grant's house, where Grant teaches him to watch television. In a particularly stirring moment, Grant buys him shoes. It's comparable to the more emotional moments of Sophie's Choice, really. Later on, some bullies throw candy at the kid, which is what bullies are known for. In the DVD you'll be able to watch alternate scenes in which the bullies throw CDs and chocolate at him, too.
Grant's character decides that single moms are better to date because there would be less commitment (the movie's single best special effect). In a Three's Company-like misunderstanding, Grant's character convinces one of these single moms that he wants to shag that he is actually a single father himself, and we keep expecting him to trip over a couch or for Mr. Firley to assume that he is gay, but that never happens. Instead, he meets an even prettier single mom who is played by a name actress (Rachel Weisz) instead of an unknown, so we know that she is the one for him. He lies to her, too, but she forgives him. In this movie we learn than single mothers are either dowdy hippies and lesbians who can barely get by with the crushing weight of the world on their shoulders or attractive women who are also rich and don't mind having some guy they've just met over to their tony London flat to put the boots to them while junior sleeps in the next bedroom.
Things work out for Grant's character in the end as he teaches his new, extended family of hippie single moms and pretty single moms and weird kids and others to all watch television with him. Things work out for the weird 12 year old, too, because at the end he has a decent haircut and is wearing the same set of jeans as all the other kids. Things work out for his relationship with his suicidal hippie vegan mom, too, because she agrees to take him to McDonald's, even though none of the characters in the film can pronounce it correctly. Everyone lives happily ever after, as they gather around Hugh Grant's television to eat Christmas dinner. Fade to smiling weird kid, the end.
About a Boy is actually a pretty good movie. It is entertaining, well scripted, winningly acted and well put together. It's not without flaws, though, and is similar to the Bridget Jones movie in that it is predictable and comforting, and features the same blend of extremely uncomfortable situations played for a combination of humor and pathos, and redeemable but flawed characters who speak with English accents so you just like them more. Grant is good, further plumbing the dark side of his character as he did in Bridget Jones (but with subtler shading and more restraint) and everyone else does what they are supposed to do, which is not fuck up the dialogue too much and sound smarter than they really are. If you liked Bridget Jones and Four Weddings and A Funeral then you’ll like this, although if you liked those movies then you’ve probably already made up your mind that you’re going to see this one, too. But you won’t be disappointed.
Oh, and it’s significantly better than High Fidelity.
Thanks, Harry…
metalmicky
