Eaten by Lions

Eaten by Lions tries too hard to be a northern feel good low budget farcical comedy.

When their parents were eaten by lions on a trip to Africa. Half brothers Omar (Antonio Aakeel) and Pete (Jack Carroll) were raised by their grandmother. After it was made clear the boys aunt did not want the asian Omar, but the disabled Pete would be reluctantly taken in as he was white.

Now teenagers the boys are on the verge of being split up again after the death of their grandmother. The aunt makes it clear that Omar is not welcome.

They leave Bradford and head to Blackpool to find Omar's real father. Only to find that dad Irfan (Asim Chaudhry) is a man child himself.

Omar tries to fit in with Irfan's extended family. Pete tries to fight off the advances of Irfan's mute relative.

There is a little bit of everything from other movies here. Steve Martin's The Jerk to the Schwarzenegger and Devito comedy vehicle Twins. The flirty relative was straight out of My Beautiful Launderette. The horrid aunt might as well be the Dursleys from Harry Potter.

Populated by eccentric characters, Johnny Vegas playing the slightly lewd Uncle Ray (another variant of Uncle Monty from Withnail and I.) It tried to be funny but rarely made me laugh.

It was a scattergun script, when the movie would had been better to let have fewer characters and let them develop.

Although a low budget film, the Blackpool scenes were well photographed.

Despite the low budget, the team behind this made a good quality and fun film. I've seen a few lower budget movies in my time and most seem to have that rough edge finish to them but this is nicely polished. The only thing I can fault it with is slightly stale acting but looking past that, it's a good little movie.

A movie you'd expect to be shown on BBC Three. I ventured out of town to see this as it wasn't showing at my local cinema. Good turn out at the screening. I found it funny as did the audience. We all had a good laugh. Recommended

Comedy drama.

Starts very strong with a heart-warming plot and frequent LOL humour.

Two half-brothers Omar and Pete are on a journey to find Omar's estranged father after their granny (who looked after them) passes away.

Pete is played by Jack Carroll, who UK viewers might recognise, but might not know why? He was a very young comedian and runner up in a recent Britain's got Talent contest. I think he was well cast and showed he can be a first rate actor as well.

Also stars Johnny Vegas, another well-known UK comedian, who wasn't used enough, he stole every scene. This is a great British film, which unfortunately really loses its way during the Rolls Royce sketch.

The film isn't perfect and has a slight feel of cheap TV movie but the gags are written well most I've laughed at a film in quite some time and is mostly well written. The storyline gets by and great cameos by Johnny Vegas and others hold it together. Overall an enjoyable film even if it didn't feel slightly tacky and jumpy storyline wise at times.