The Inbetweeners 2 (16) ***
The first Inbetweeners film was a massive hit back in 2011, upping the stakes for this sequel, which avoids most of the pitfalls of the follow-up by delivering a sharp script that brings plenty of laughs to this otherwise-patchy film.
The coarse humour that helped make the original film a success has been upped this time round. I counted at least six willies, while an extended gag involving diarrhoea and a 50-foot water slide will not leave my mind anytime soon. Maybe don’t bring your granny to this one.
Set a year after the craziness of their holiday in Crete, the guys set off to Australia for a month-long break.
They’ve been invited over by Jay, who claims to have a top job in a nightclub in Sydney and has promised lots of partying and women.
When they land the reality is different and it’s not long before the four lads are sharing a tent and making idiots of themselves.
What the film does brilliantly is send up the more pretentious students who embark on a trip to “find themselves” by indulging in new-age nonsense.
They unfold when Will - always the intellectual of the bunch - hangs out with them in the hope of getting together with posh girl Katie, who’s also on the radar of hairbraided git Ben.
The movie falls apart in the second half, when an extended scene in the desert - where the lads face peril - feels like the filmmakers have simply run out of ideas.
The pace really drags and it feels like it might be too much to expect the guys to deliver a third movie. Box office success might dictate otherwise.
God’s Pocket (15A) **
Before his tragic death earlier this year, actor Philip Seymour Hoffman had completed a number of movie projects.
One of them, this drama set in an ironically named suburb in Philadelphia, never really navigates the tricky line between tragedy and comedy. Nevertheless, Hoffman’s presence shows why he was one of cinema’s best-loved actors.
Mad Men actor John Slattery has assembled an impressive cast for his directorial debut. But despite all the talent onscreen, he and his cast struggle to keep the frankly bonkers plotline on track.
It’s a shame, because God’s Pocket stars so well. Set in the gritty neighbourhood in the 1980s, Hoffman play construction boss Mickey Scarpato, who’s forced to do some covering up when his violent stepson is killed during an “incident” on the site.
Not only does Mickey have a body and a story to hide and a grieving wife Jeanie (Christina Hendricks) to placate, but there are financial woes too.
His business is struggling and now he’s got to find the money for the funeral – and even with fixer connections like dodgy pal Arthur (John Turturro), the walls seem to be closing in on him.
The cynical local mortician (Eddie Marsan) is not doing him any favours either. But the heat is really turned on when a boozy newspaper columnist, Richard Shelburn (Richard Jenkins) gets a whiff that there’s more to the death than meets the eye, and arouses Jeanie’s suspicions into the bargain.
It’s obvious that Slattery is aiming for a pitch-black comedy but he never really manages to marry the two and the tonal oddness is not helped by some daft plot twists in the second half.
