Sunday

You may not have even noticed the release of Semi-Pro. I'm not sure that I did. The release of a movie in the UK often depends upon how well it's done in America (although, conversely, certain films are promoted here more because producers believe we'll appreciate them better). I'm guessing the film didn't do well either here or there and there are two reasons for this. It stars Will Ferrell as the owner, coach and player of a basketball team in the 1970s. The team faces dissolution when their league proposes a merger with the NBA. In order to avoid being dissolved, his team have to finish in the top 4. As you can tell, this sounds like a derivative mix between Anchorman and Dodgeball, and it is. There's no hiding that. The concept isn't original. And the plot follows the contrived line of every sport movie: success, failure, success (only in the really great films do you not notice this narrative, or not mind it). Nonetheless, I think this is an extremely funny movie. If you like Will Ferrell, and I do, then you'll love this film. The jokes are great, even though some of them aren't built up sufficiently. The characters' back-stories and romances are messy, but then this is a comedy, and it made me laugh. The second reason the film didn't do well, which I'll try to tell you without ruining the ending, is in the team's hunt for 4th place: these guys aren't winners and they never will be. So, as long as you don't expect too much, and love Will Ferrell, this film is a great fun.

Tuesday

Last night I saw Her Naked Skin, showing at the National Theatre. My first problem comes when I attempt to tell you what the play was about. This normally simple task reveals one of the main flaws of this drama. It couldn't decide what it wanted to be about, and so ended up being about nothing. The background was the suffragette movement of the early twentieth century, and the foreground involved two women falling in love. If the play had been about either one of these things alone, it might have succeeded. After all, the acting was superb, and much of the dialogue excellent. But there was no one drive, or focus, to the narrative. I didn't feel pulled along in any way, either through sympathy or hatred towards any of the characters. The first half was composed of many short scenes, with many characters, leaving the audience confused. I felt indeed that it was a play that wanted to be a film. The second half contained much longer, intense scenes, that worked better, but surely they should have come in the first half when the audience had more patience? Whatever the outcome of this pacing, the play didn't work for me, and it also didn't work on the stage itself. Although the set design was intriguing, it couldn't fill the (admittedly large) stage. There were always large empty spaces that distracted your attention when the actors couldn't keep it - which unfortunately was quite often. You may or may not know that this is the first play by a female writer to be on the main stage at the National Theatre. I couldn't help thinking that if you wanted to show the brilliance of female writers, you would want to show that they can write about any topic or theme. By putting on a play about lesbian feminists they help to stereotype themselves.