Hey folks Harry here with Smilin' Jack Ruby and a look at one of those quirky heartwarming British blue collar type a films that we're all familiar with. I know next to nothing about this film, but I figure I'll just hand it over to ol Jack and let ya stand agog...
Hey, Harry,
Just writing in about a new Irish film that Fox Searchlight is bringing on over to our shores in hopes of continuing the wave of successful UK imports like "The Full Monty" and "Waking Ned Devine." The well's running a little dry, but they trying again this year with "The Closer You Get," complete with trailers that bear a distinct liking to both pics I mentioned earlier.
"The Closer You Get" takes place in a remote area of County Donegal Ireland and is about a group of bachelors that believe they'll never find exciting girls among the locals, so they band together and place an ad in the "Miami Herald" to entice women to their shores with the mind to marry. As all the men folk of the town, married and otherwise, begin buzzing about with the possibility of American women hitting their town, the opposite effect happens to the local girls who become increasingly frustrated.
The stars of the movie include Ian Hart as the lead, Kieran, most recently seen in "The End of the Affair" as the private detective as well as the ultra-familiar-but-I-can't-really-place him Sean McGinley who was in "The Butcher Boy" along with Hart and a number of other recent Irish films.
This isn't a bad movie, just a rather quiet one that's neither all that exciting or all that memorable. There were a number of genuinely funny moments and you really started to feel for some of the characters who really felt like they were trapped in the middle of nowhere and would never get out or see real adventure. But that's about the extent of it. It's almost too quiet a movie as nothing ever really happens. The main reason to bring this up is to avoid others from falling into the trap that the trailers try to spring by presenting this as a quirky, 5 down-on-their-luck guys try for one last shot at greatness with a truly absurd plan and mimic the success of "The Full Monty." I love "The Full Monty" and this isn't it.
It's the lightest of the featherweight foreign comedies I've seen lately and one to wait and catch on video - if that's your cup of tea (the organizers, in an interesting strategy, passed out Irish Breakfast tea bags to the people waiting in line).
-Smilin' Jack Ruby
