Wedding Belles

A great film, well worth watch a great writing duo on the rise. Watch this space. The film moves with pace, and determination. You are not allowed to catch your breath, until the commercial breaks.

A great break away from the Bridget Jones cliché of women. The film takes you on a journey of mayhem, madness and mischief, yet the bond between the four lasses overrides any conflicts they face from the outside world. They are as thick as thieves. It's so nice to feel an deep empathy for the central characters.

The sound track fits the pace of the film perfectly. Moreover I was amused that certain tabloids went on the moral high ground, over certain scenes that they felt were offensive. Newspapers that insist on exploiting women to sell their papers, a classic case of calling of the pot calling the kettle black.

I can't wait for Irvine Welsh's and Dean Cavanagh's next feature, are they the new Galton & Simpson ?

Irvine Welsh. Where would he be without Trainspotting? No-where. He'd be an unpublished writer working in a bar. This awful attempt to write female roles is so clichéd and embarrassing that Mr Welsh should do the literary world a huge favour and go away.

Of course he's not the only writer credited for this inept script, but it has Welsh's grubby fingerprints all over it - unfunny farce, 'Allo-Allo style erotica, clichéd misanthropy, and his trademark nowhere-to-go ending! The fact that this has come out on DVD the day after being screened on TV is blind & ludicrous by the powers that be at CH4 who sanctioned this drivel in the first place. Who is going to buy this? If you watched it, you would never consider buying it. If you haven't seen it, surely you'll wait for the endless repeats on More4 or E4 - and then switch off within the hour. I'm not even going to talk about the plot-less plot. This is about Welsh. A one-hit wonder who has made enough money to respect his loyal audience and stop inflicting this unfunny lazy work upon them. 1 out of 10 for the hapless actresses who try & fail.

It's unfortunate that this programme's IMDb rating has been dragged down by one person who just plain didn't like it. Note that *every* other reviewer has given it a 10...and how often does that happen? From the fantastic, surreal opening sequence to the close, this is simply British TV drama at its best. Hilarious yes, as others have noted, but also one of the most moving portraits of friendship I can remember seeing. The script is razor sharp, every performance flawless, the direction superb. Not a dull moment from start to finish. This one is going to *rack* up the awards. The only problem I can see from an American's perspective is the accents - Glaswegian you could cut with a Stanley knife. My guess is it'll get subtitles when it hits HBO, as it surely must. Irvine Welsh - maestro! Dennis Potter couldn't have done it better...and praise comes no higher than that.

Sorry, but I must disagree with the earlier rave reviews. I find that raunchy humor and dark humor aren't the same thing. Overall this film was just raunchy. The only consistent theme through the film was the hate Rhona, Shaz etc. had for men who had hurt them emotionally. If the women's roles were transposed with men's roles & vice versa, the film would never have been made. It would have been greeted with howls of execration.

Looking into the lives of what Americans call 'white trash' isn't particularly entertaining. If the story had an underlying theme that challenged the imagination and intellect, I would have stayed interested. But it didn't. I thought it was just an overlong collection of randy skits.

If this is called 'Scottish drama', then what on earth can we learn about Scotland from it? Yikes!

Wow! Just caught this on DVD and I have to say I'm blown away. Irvine Welsh and Dean Cavanagh's "Wedding Belles" is simply a breath of fresh air. It's like a cross between a Quentin Tarantino and Mike Leigh film. It's got energy, hilarity, passion, irreverence and heart. A GREAT BIG HEART! I've haven't seen women portrayed this well on screen since...you know, I couldn't really say! From the surreal beginning to the heartbreaking end this film never slacks for a second. Wave after wave of attention grabbing scenes fly out at you and you just never know what's going to happen next.

It feels and looks so unlike a UK production because of its ambition. Like Trainspotting before it, Wedding Belles kind of invents its own genre. Chick flick? Romcom? Black comedy? Revenge movie? I couldn't really say. What I can say though is that you simply MUST SEE THIS FILM. I'd defy anyone to watch it and not get hooked.

The performances from Henderson and Gomez are career defining and Kathleen McDermott and Shauna McDonald are stars on the up. The direction from Phillip John is sublime and the photography? Wow! It's like a painting.

All this and a soundtrack that manages to put Queens Of The Stone Age, Irma Thomas, The Pixies and Lonnie Donegan side by side without it feeling anything but natural and you've got a great work of art.