theguests-southport

Many cinematic releases of late have excelled at contaminating us with dross, puerile swearing and mindless violence. Here then is an oasis of colour in both settings and characters. The first film was a heart-warming experience, which reacquainted viewers with what good cinema should be about. The sequel is equally as splendid - in my opinion, and judging by my fellow cinema-goers, by all of those attendees to. No violence, no swearing, no lavatorial humour. Gosh, what is the world coming to? Just dollops of old-fashioned (and I am not ashamed of using the term), gentle humour. The film is chock-full of some of our (British, that is) top-notch thespians and boy, do they knock anything our Yankee brethren could conceive in a million years into a cocked hat. Okay,Richard Gere pops up as the token 'American', but even he is out-acted by the British and Indian cast ten times over. For two hours of sheer entertainment, with a feel-good factor tipping the scales, then you will be hard pushed to beat this fine example.

The first few series were amusing and contained some above-average episodes demonstrating wit and humour – above-average for a sitcom, that is!

Alas, the departure of Tim Vine heralded the death knell of the show three series back, following which it has never quite managed to recover, and since when the writing and the gags have become boringly repetitive. Even the introduction of the bizarrely bland character played by Hugh Dennis in the latest run has failed to ignite any great hilarity.

Lee Mack's writing can be amusing with good comic one-liners, but now in its seventh (and possibly final) series, even these are sounding decidedly staid and forced.

Furthermore, some of the story lines of this latest series (November/December 2014) have actually been borderline offensive, particularly in the cack-handed way in which they have been portrayed – making fun of alcoholism, and then the sudden desire of Lucy's to have a baby by artificial insemination - well these are not normally topics associated with top-notch comedy writing.

The one enjoyable episode of this current run was the story involving the Pointless game show hosts. Here there were indications of a return to form for that one brief episode.

John Cleese and Rowan Atkinson had the right attitude with their comedy ventures – leave your audience hungry for more, rather than milking one basic idea for all it's worth.

It's a shame, because in its early days, Not Going Out could be relied on to raise more than an average amount of laughs.

An ocean's worth of clichéd characters inhabit the rusty old submarine (and script) skippered by an obscurely Scottish Jude Law in search of … well yes, in search of that old faithful of such nautical adventures – a cache of Nazi gold bullion nestling in the rusty hull of a sunken German U-boat. Or, rather, maybe it was Russian gold? Whatever; it's sitting there at the bottom of the Black Sea just waiting to be plundered.

Writer Dennis Kelly has surely populated his story with every stereotypical, sweaty, unshaven macho alpha-male he's ever chanced upon in similar though far loftier stories of this genre.

The film is shot mainly in shades of grey and black with the odd splash of red lighting to emphasis trouble is brewing way down beneath the waves, and forewarning the audience of a further onslaught of "effing and blinding" about to be unleashed on their eardrums. And as for those Russian accents….. 'The Man from UNCLE' conjured up more linguistic realism back in 1968.

Admittedly, the claustrophobic atmosphere aboard the sub is enthusiastically portrayed and some of the set explosive interludes are well orchestrated; but honestly, one feels no responsiveness towards any of the characters and I really couldn't have cared less as to who lived or died. Surely not what the author or director should have intended? If a viewer can't identify or empathise with at least one character in a film; then the whole point of that movie's existence needs to be questioned.

Some of the continuity was bizarre to say the least. At one point, in a fit of wrath following a member of his motley crew discovering he'd won the lottery (don't ask; it's a scene that is about as believable as The Tooth Fairy), our pseudo-Scottish Captain smashes the only receiver aboard the vessel with a wrench, only to be seen attempting to use the same said radio equipment an hour further into the movie, with ne'er a mark or dint to be spied on its pristine surface.

By the time the film's spiralling implausible narrative has successfully disposed of most of the unlikeable crew, and a sudden potential way of escaping the quickly-sinking script is 'discovered'- one that is set to trigger off yet further disquiet and fisticuffs amongst the survivors - I'd given up the will to continue and vacated the cinema ten-minutes before the (presumably) quite daft conclusion. Who survived, if any, I couldn't tell you, nor alas do I care.

And as for that Russian-cum-Nazi gold..............

Jude Law – must try harder! Please note.