Sometimes Always Never

If it wasn't for the presence of mobile phones and computer games you'd think that this was set in the 60's ! Bill Nighy is sparsely twinkly, just enough to make me stay in my seat for the entire film. A good cast, an intriguing storyline, almost a period piece. I think Bill must have it in his contract for every piece he does to wear a good coat. (Apart from Dads Army).

'Sometimes Always Never (2019)' is a bit of an oddity, I suppose, because of its combination of mundanity and quirkiness. It tells a grounded - though, ever-so-slightly absurdist - story with a real emotional weight to it, often with genuine subtlety but more frequently with a strange sort of passivity, and tends to toe the line between comedy and drama to the point that a distinction between the two isn't really worth making. It's not like it's particularly unfocused or haphazard, however, as it certainly feels calculated. Yet, even in its almost articulated unwillingness to conform to convention, there's a sort of intangible sense that it doesn't quite know how odd it is. It's exactly what it wants, and needs, to be. As you can tell, it's a fairly difficult experience to categorise. All in all, though, it's an enjoyable one. It has a compelling central theme and a nice set of main characters, even if the former isn't fleshed out as much as you'd like thanks to a somewhat baggy mid-section. The tone of the thing also fluctuates a little. Usually, it balances the serious with the silly, making sure that both do a decent job of developing character, but there are some moments that make you wish the movie would make its mind up as to whether or not its world is actually 'heightened' (which could be pushed further, if that is the case). It sometimes sounds overly 'written', too; this isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the sequences where you actually notice the writing pale in comparison to the ones where you don't. I'll also say that, while it's well directed overall, there are some visual stylistic choices that I don't think pay off. Of course, these issues don't prevent the flick from being generally entertaining. It's somewhat endearing, with great performances and (from what came through in the final result) a good screenplay. It's not perfect, or indeed overly satisfying, and its odd tone - or general 'status', I guess - does make it a bit difficult to get a handle on. Still, it's a good effort that nicely tells a personal, rather unique story. 6/10

Despite the rather grim topic, the film manages not to be overly sad. In fact it is an enjoyable journey of a father who becomes obsessed with scrabble in order to cope with his loss. It is a good psychological portrayal pf grief.

First off, the catchy title is simply a reference to guidance wearing a 3-button suit coat, sometimes the top button, always the middle button, never the bottom button. The main character is a tailor, he gives the advice to his teen grandson

Bill Nighy is Alan, Scrabble fan with two adult sons, and a teen grandson. One son, Michael, is missing, apparently he got up from a Scrabble game and left, they never heard from him again.

Several times the script references the Biblical prodigal son story, the one son who remained connected feels he isn't getting the love he deserves and all dad cares about is finding the missing son.

The story is a family relationship drama but sprinkled with humor. Bill Nighy makes it a worthwhile movie, all the other characters could have been played by almost anyone. However it was also good to see Jenny Agutter in a small role, she was mid-60s during filming, who could forget her performance in "Walkabout" when she was still a teenager?

I watched this on Amazon streaming movies.

Just to address the marmite topic brought up by another reviewer: It was illustrated in the film that Billy Nighy's character Alan was not a reliable story teller. He liked to tell tall tales, like the one about the grandmother with the coal seam in the basement. Going back to the movie, I thought it was quirky like everyone mentioned. I knew it wasn't going to be a straight forward dramedy based on the bizarre, artificial riding in car scenes. It looked like it was done in a 1950s B movie style. Thankfully the movie dials back on that and delivers a fairly straight forward, drama comedy framed around the game of scrabble, but really about Alan and his son Peter, as they try to solve the mystery of the missing son Michael. The body viewing scene (which we don't see) was particularly odd, because we were told that Michael went missing many many years ago when he and Peter were still children. So why would they be called to identify a body? If it was an adult's body, how would they know it was him. Usually they do DNA tests anyway. Other than that weird start, and some scene involving a boat (or did it?), much of the movie follows a fairly linear format. I think it helps that every character in the movie had something to offer the movie, and generally everyone was likeable. You kind of hoped there would be a resolution of the 'mystery', but ultimately it didn't really matter. Nothing is really 'solved' by the ending, except maybe Peter wasn't as resentful of his missing brother's 'Prodigal Son' stature, and maybe Alan realized it was time to focus on his existing family.