Starter for 10

I really really enjoyed this film. No, it wasn't an in-depth "gritty" drama, probing the dark side of the mundane, nor did it hold any strong political or social message. But this is a sweet, touching and, most of all, funny film.

Starter for Ten relies heavily on the charm and comedy of the characters in the film to carry it over a fairly weak plot, but seeing as the outcome is such a cheerful and good natured film, i have no complaints! My own favourite character was Patrick, the oh-so serious leader of the team, but all of the cast were strong and the characters all likable in their own ways.

S.for.Ten left me with a big smile on my face- a silly, feel good British comedy which doesn't take itself too seriously. Enjoy!

Starter for 10 is directed by Tom Vaughan and adapted to screenplay by David Nicholls from his own novel of the same name. It stars James McAvoy, Alice Eve, Rebecca Hall, Dominic Cooper, Benedict Cumberbatch, Catherine Tate and Elaine Tan. Music is by Blake Neely and cinematography by Ashley Rowe.

Set in 1985 England, working-class student Brian Jackson (McAvoy) navigates his first year at Bristol University - which lends him the opportunity to feature on his favourite ever TV Quiz Show - University Challenge.

I have never read the book so have no frame of reference there, thus the complaints from devotees of the written source are null and void to me. For I absolutely loved this film, a fresh and breezy coming of age comedy that's tinted with dramatic intelligence. How nice to have a pic of this genre ilk that's not built around trying to lose one's virginity, or standing up to bullies etc. For sure there's a whole load of angst on show, a bit of class distinction dichotomy, the perils of formative fumbling romances, and of course whimsy. Yet the framework of education, the thirst for knowledge and an understanding of the problems evident in the world at time of pic's setting, all make this a smarter than your average bear British rites of passage piece.

Cast are on splendid form to make the multidimensional characters work (each main character moves away from being mere caricatures). McAvoy is splendidly affable as Brian, who is still nursing the loss of his father years previously, and then has to watch as his mother (Tate) takes a lover - the local ice-cream man (John Henshaw). It's no easier at University, where he lusts after the blonde bomber (Eve) when in fact he obviously should cop on to the fact that the girl for him is bleeding heart socialist Rebecca Epstein (Hall) - but she isn't the quiz type! McAvoy has a good comedy way about him, gawkish but lovable and perfect when portraying Brian out of his depth in certain scenarios.

Of the others it's Cumberbatch who steals the show as Patrick Watts, an absolute toff, an upper class twit who has no comprehension of the working class system and the perils within that structure. He is burned by his miserable failure on University Challenge the previous year, his inadequacies and stubborness blinding him to the benefits that others around him can afford him. The facial expressions, the posh vocab speak and the need to be in charge are brought vividly to comic life by Cumberbatch. Eve smoulders as Alice, but deftly plays her vulnerabilities, Hall has her character down pat, while Cooper, Tate and James Corden leave favourable marks. As do Charles Dance and Lindsay Duncan in unforgettable scenes as Alice's parents.

The whole play is covered over with an 80s soundtrack, mixing student favourites with punky pop tunes, while the period detail for Brian's home life prior to going to University (Southend-On-Sea) has been given great nostalgic thought. A lot of the humour is sure to be too British for none UK folk, more so those not familiar with what the mid 1980s were like in Britain, while it has to be acknowledged that where the story ends up holds no surprises. Yet this holds many pleasures for the right audience, so fingers on the button and see if you get this starter for 10.

This film has to be one of my favourites since I was forced to watch it by cultural people. Luckily I was not disappointed.

The general story is of a Brian (McAvoy), an intelligent and clever young man who after going to university in Bristol, joins the University Challenge team. During this time, he falls for an attractive blonde on the team called Alice (Eve) while being completely oblivious to the affections of the beautiful intellectual, Rebecca Epstein (Hall).

The film has a great cast and some good comedy moments. A great cast, and some good dialogue. There's not much else to say about it, but that if you ever feel unhappy and depressed, watch this gem, it will not disappoint in cheering you up.

Starter For Ten (three stars)

Director Tom Vaughan Writer David Nicholls Stars Ian Bonar, Alice Eve, Rebecca Hall, Catherine Tate Certificate 12A Running time 96 minutes Country UK / USA Year 2006

Don't let the pathetically weak opening scene - a flashback of a university applicant as a boy, watching University Challenge and guessing the answers - put you off. Starter For Ten actually manages to get better. Although nominally about qualifying to be on the TV famous game show, the film is really a light-hearted coming-of-age drama set in the 80s. It has convincing performances and a lovingly recreated period of Thatcher Britain, when corduroy was cool and Kate Bush was for intellectuals.

Working class Brian was not born clever - he has to work at it. Gaining entry to a posh university, he meanders through undergraduate days with a classic dilemma: do you fall in love with the intellectually attractive brunette or the blonde goddess? Karl Marx, Freud and John Lennon, like smoking hash and learning how to do blowbacks, are all part of the social landscape of what is trendy and what isn't. Half way in, the film subject matter allows plenty of social commentary on the irksome British class divisions that penetrate romance, friendship and the University Challenge team.

Versatile Catherine Tate puts in an amiable performance as Brian's ever supportive and cooing mother: she's having an affair with the ice-cream van man ("you can hear him coming"). This enjoyable no-brainer of a movie is aided and abetted by a blistering 80s soundtrack with bands such as The Cure, Psychedelic Furs, Buzzcocks, Yazoo, The Smiths, Tears for Fears, The Undertones - and Kate Bush.

Starter for Ten is not searing drama, but it does make a pleasant and worthwhile trip down nostalgia lane. The characters are ones we can love and care about and the movie mostly avoids predictability and cheese. If "the most important questions in life are the ones we already know the answer to," and are not exactly rocket science, the subject matter of Starter For Ten is a welcome and unpretentious antidote to the plethora of similar American teen comedies. If you like the music, it's worth going for that alone.

Surveying the wreckage of numerous other such films - burdened at their outset with flimsy premises, one-dimensional characters, stale gimmicks that coast on the fumes of pop cultural trends, and implausible "meet-cute" situations - which could not be sustained even with big-name talent, inestimable budgets, and plague-like advertising campaigns, I was understandably sceptical as to how the "romantic comedy" aspect of this film might play out when I first sat down to watch it. In retrospect, I honestly couldn't have been more pleased. Rare indeed is the occasion when I have walked out of a theatre feeling unambiguously good about what I saw, believing that it was well worth the time and money I spent to watch it.

The story forming the basis of "Starter for 10" is handled with a great deal of humour, sensitivity, and intelligence. At no time did any part of it feel forced or contrived, nor was it condescending. Testament to this film's openness and accessibility, the emotional connection that I formed with the primary character (James MacEvoy - may he have a long and distinguished career ahead of him) was subtly cultivated throughout, reinforced by simple - yet heartachingly truthful - moments of confusion, awkwardness, uncertainty, and disappointment of the kind anyone might experience (and probably has) in similar circumstances. "Starter for 10" masterfully captures the spirit of that time in one's life wherein a person fully enters the world and begins to establish her- or himself as an individual.

So often, and unfortunately, it is the case that I see people on the screen with whom I cannot identify, in situations to which I cannot relate (this is typically due in part to the performers' overblown celebrity status and the general "Hollywood" gloss that is spread thickly over the top of everything). Not so where "Starter for 10" is concerned.

Perhaps it's no coincidence that "Starter for 10" references "The Graduate," since I believe it shall, in time, prove itself a worthy descendant of that film's legacy and subsequently receive the higher profile that it deserves.