Four Play

I never really understood these kinds of films. What we have here are a group of people attracted to one another, and going through the throws of success, sex and life in some kind of hapless social foray. One that really doesn't produce any kind of result. No happy endings here, and for all of the attempt at humor, there isn't too much that's funny here.

In this sense it's sort of an old fashioned comedy; i.e. stuff that's not really funny to begin with, but is presented with a kind of humorous attitude. Beyond that, there isn't too much to be made of this film.

Mariel Hemingway is gorgeous as ever, and Colin Firth attempts to save a struggling film with superior thesping. The others hold their own in the acting department. Camera angles are fairly plain. There's nothing really inspiring about this film. It promised to be a sex comedy, but doesn't do much for either promise.

Watch at your own risk.

Not a true representation of us Brit's, I do not think, (hope!) but then I am not a Londoner. It's very quirky and has a honest feel in it's style, and some lovely shots of London, beautiful lighting, gives it this dreamy glow.

Bit of a fore runner for love actually this film.

Colin Firth fan's, looking for Mr Darcy fans will be disappointed, more the Fever Pitch character here probably, but he plays it brilliantly as usual.

It is a really modern, deep look at relationships, which could tee of some great conversations.

Also very funny in places, Stephen Fry is so funny as the therapist and Jack Dee is his usual wonderful self, although it is strange to see him sharing a stage.

Definitely worth a watch this film.

Carly Portland is the American star of British sitcom Tetford Gate produced by her husband Allen Portland. Ratings are falling so they bring in American writer Ben Greene. With time Ben falls for and marries the shows stunning French make-up artist Fiona Delgrazia. However it is not long before the feelings Ben has for Carly start to cause his relationship with Fiona to suffer. Meanwhile, he notices that Fiona and Allen are also getting close. Thus starts several years of relationship twists and turns between the four people.

I'm not entirely sure where to start with this film. On the surface it is some sort of romantic comedy but it doesn't really have much in it that makes for convincing "love" or indeed anything that I would describe as being all that funny. The end result is a film that never once engaged me and just came across as mistakenly thinking itself to be funnier and smarter than it actually was. So it moves along with dialogue that it cannot maintain and a confidence that it does not deserve to have. The fault for this must rest almost totally with writer and director Mike Binder. He has written characters that are not easy to relate to or understand or indeed even to like. The quartet of characters are poorly developed and they seem to do things for the sake of it; I'm not referring to their actions as people driven by lust (who can ever apply logic to such things) but specifically things like the fights outside pubs, which seemed to drop in from another film or be an idea that Binder had but had nobody working with him able to just say "you know what? this doesn't work").

As a result the film just flops long in a series of "ideas" without any real cohesion or reason to stick with it. The cast struggle and it shows. Binder himself seems to be under the illusion that he has written a modern relationship drama that will make him this generation's Woody Allen and as an actor he comes over like he knows it. It is a weak performance and he grated on me throughout. Firth is not as bad but just seems totally unsure of who he is playing. Hemingway is OK while Jacob is sexy as a presence but poor as a narrator. Small turns from Fry, Dee, Marcus and a few other well known faces do nothing really as they lack the material to work with.

Overall then a poor romantic comedy. The characters are poor and the actors cannot work with them or their dialogue as a result. The story and lives are unconvincing and there is not a spark of inspiration or wit to be had across the whole thing. I had never heard of this film before I recorded it a few weeks ago – now I understand why.

Other than saccharine shots of West London, if that appeals to you, and a lesson in "how not to do it" this film has relatively little to offer. The problem is in the writing. Many scenes are badly written, painfully unfunny - such as the sessions with the Stephen Fry's "labour relations" counselor -, or simply misjudged - the late night pub brawl which seems to be trying to reprise the excellent fight at the end of Bridget Jones' Diary, but looks more like a sick sub-Ritchiesque gangland denouement. To their credit, the actors do a good job with the material they are given. The plot is promising, and somewhere there was a good film in here but one feels that combining the roles of writer, director and lead actor lead to a fatal loss of internal critical tension.

This is a mishmash. it is attempting to achieve something but since it fails badly it is hard to know what. Is this a light comedy? Is this a Woody Allen take off? God knows...its all over the place but I loved the scenery of London in the summer. I liked the Mind of the Married Man on HBO and was sorry when they cancelled it but this is most peculiar. Possibly a slightly better script and decidedly better directing might have transformed this film ie made it more comprehensible. A bit of editing and the London Tourist Board would love it. But most of it is pretentious crap.