The One and Only

I saw this film on TV and must confess to having never heard of it before - but i cannot think why! Why wasn't this great little movie given more chance in the box office? Why wasn't it widely distributed???? It was genuinely very very funny. Not only did i find myself laughing out loud the whole way through it, but it also had great dialogue, a great story, excellent characters and a fantastic plot. All in all this was a very enjoyable and quite unexpected movie. If you get a chance - watch it! The plot surrounds two couples - one are everyday and unhappy in their relationship. The other are an Italian football star and his kept wife. Couple one adopt an African girl and couple two are trying to have a baby. But then Guy from first couple falls in love with kept wife. A great little side story involves the first guys friend who is an absolute slob who has crazy sex with some woman he happens to meet in late night supermarkets who also happens to be the sister of the footballers wife. There is far far more to it than all this thought! It is a fantastic story and a great comedy. I have to ask again...why didn't this get distributed better in the cinemas???? The distribution/production company were not doing their job!

Really funny film, with some beautiful locations and wonderful acting. The actor who plays Stan is fantastic and I couldn't wait for him to reappear. Very stylish and beautifully filmed. Light and easy entertainment, that made me laugh a lot.

Really not the best genre movie around but an enjoyable and good enough on to watch.

The real problem of the movie is its simplicity and its emotionless distant approach of it all. The movie really isn't the best or most clever written movies but it nevertheless is a well made one, with some good directing, acting and overall backdrop and atmosphere.

The movie is hanging together from its coincidences. The movie too heavily relies on coincidences, which really doesn't make the most believable movie around. It's a style that works so well in other British movies, just not in this one.

This movie is somewhere in the middle of everything. It has too many comedy to be a drama and too much drama to really be a comedy. It makes the movie an unbalanced one, as you can never be to sure with what approach to watch this movie. Because of this nothing in the movie ever really works out as good as it was supposed to.

The movie also doesn't really work out as a romantic movie, since the love between the two main characters just isn't notably present enough. Not necessarily the actors fault but more because of the approach of the movie. Their relationship is more believable- and would had worked better as a friendship between two people who went through a hard time and supported each other in it. But it wouldn't had been a romantic-comedy then, now would it.

At least the actors still did their very best. Richard Roxburgh once more shows his versatility as an actor. Michael Hodgson is also good as the more comical relief of the movie. Jonathan Cake on the other hand isn't the greatest. His character is way too stereotypical and totally unoriginal to find it funny.

Nevertheless it's an harmless movie to watch. It's a movie that does not bore and is an easy one on the eye and mind.

6/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

I caught this on late night TV, and missed the beginning. After a few minutes I was sat up in bed. This had caught my attention. At the time I thought it was a TV production, similar to Cold Feet (one of my favourite series). Not as much 'warmth' as Cold Feet, but this was funny, sad, tragic, etc. All the ingredients needed for a black comedy. Comedy appeals to a wide spectrum, and this won't please everyone. But to me it is one of the funniest 'black comedies' since No Surrender (1985). I'm from the North East, and found the accents quite believable. In fact, I thought that the main actors were Geordies. Never heard of either of them, but I'll be looking out for them, especially Justine Waddell, who was a bit of a dish. I shall go out and buy the Video or DVD, and give a copy to those friends of mine, who are on a similar comedy wavelength to myself.

Jimmy Nail's Spender had already shown that the North East had some great locations, so I wasn't surprised at some of the great outdoor shots in this film. I have a feeling that there will be more to come from this area, and from Justine Waddell.

This is one of the nicest and funniest movies I have seen recently, and is one of those titles you want to see more than a one and only time. It was tucked away on the bottom shelf of a Belgium videotheque; it never reached the cinemas in Belgium, nor in the Netherlands. Hence it didn't get any attention to a broader audience; what a shame! For starters the plot is as simple as it is good and the story build around sticks to it and is credible. The film breathes a certain low budget atmosphere and there is hardly any outstanding camera work, though it delivers quite some great stills. Comparisons are made with Notting Hill. Regarding that I would say the Notting Hill film has better photography with great color but has the rather slik Hollywood like fairy tale setting, where as The One And Only is definitely much funnier, not only in dialogue, has the better soundtrack and stands, again not only regarding the more prosaic dialogue, closer to reality. As a foreigner I wasn't bothered by perhaps not so good northern accents; they sounded perfectly genuine to me. And what a heavenly lass miss Waddel is!