Three years on from the first film, the marmalade-loving little bear is back on the big screen with another madcap adventure.
Paddington is settled with the Brown family and has become a popular member of the Windsor Gardens community (well, with everyone except the curmudgeonly Mr Curry). When on the look-out for the perfect birthday present for Aunt Lucy, he finds an old pop-up book in Mr Gruber's antique shop and resolves to get a job to pay for it. However, the book is stolen- and Paddington ends up in prison. It's down to the Browns to prove Paddington's innocence and find the real culprit.
One word kept going through my head as I watched Paddington 2. Charming. The whole endeavour is absolutely charming. I'd say it's nigh-on impossible to leave the cinema without a warm, fuzzy glow and a smile on your face after seeing this film.
It's impossible not to warm to Paddington's naively optimistic view of the world. He's a true believer in the good in people and, even when things prove otherwise, he still holds on to that thought. Ben Whishaw's wonderfully light and earnest voice performance really helps to sell that. Hugh Bonneville and Sally Hawkins are great as Mr and Mrs Brown, while Julie Walters gives a warm performance as Scottish housekeeper Mrs Bird.
Hugh Grant seems to be having a ball as the flamboyantly villainous Phoenix Buchanan, a West End actor reduced to doing dog food commercials. He thinks the pop-up book is a treasure map to reveal a lost fortune, which will restore him to his rightful place on the stage in a one-man show. He makes for a wonderfully unctuous villain. Brendan Gleeson is similarly great as hardman Knuckles McGinty who Paddington meets in prison.
There's an veritable cornucopia of British acting talent on display here, many in very minor roles: Michael Gambon, Imelda Staunton, Eileen Atkins, Meera Syal, Joanna Lumley, Peter Capaldi, Jim Broadbent, Jessica Hynes and Richard Ayoade all make appearances, with a particularly good turn by Tom Conti as a grumpy High Court judge.
The whole design of the film is also great, with some wonderful visual flourishes; in one sequence, Paddington imagines himself and Aunt Lucy in the pages of the pop-up book, visiting the sights.
This is an utterly delightful film, with something for the whole family. Very enjoyable indeed.
Rating: 5 out of 5
Tez
The story of American soprano Florence Foster Jenkins may not be known to many, but that will change with the latest film by Stephen Frears (Philomena, Mrs Henderson Presents, The Queen) which stars Meryl Streep in the title role.
Jenkins was famed for being one of the worst singers to perform in public (a posthumous collection of her recordings has the slightly arch title Murder On The High Cs). An eccentric New York heiress, Jenkins wanted to become an opera singer and had the money to indulge that desire- despite not having the requisite talent to go with it. She was consistently flat, with very little sense of pitch or rhythm, appalling foreign pronunciation and attempted songs that were far beyond her range and ability (such as the challenging 'Queen Of The Night' aria from The Magic Flute). She only ever gave one recital to which the general public could attend, booking out Carnegie Hall in October 1944 when she was at the grand age of 76. She was once quoted as saying 'People may say I can't sing, but no one can ever say I didn't sing' (an admirable sentiment)
Frears' film takes a standard biopic approach, with the climax being the Carnegie Hall performance.
Streep's performance is, as you would expect, flawless (even if the script doesn't always match). She plays Jenkins' eccentric little tics broadly but without ever lapsing into caricature, whilst also showing a more tender and emotional side- Jenkins had a tragic early marriage to a man who would give her syphilis on her wedding night (which may have accounted for some of her difficulties in later life). Her bad singing is very bad, so bad as to almost be good (much like playing the piano, it seems one has to be very good at something to do it badly).
Hugh Grant gives one of his best performances in years as St Clair Bayfield, Jenkins' second husband, a Shakespearean actor who later acted as her manager. He's sweetly indulgent of Jenkins' plans, never once pulling her short or bringing her back to earth, supporting her and protecting her even in the face of public ridicule (on the morning after the Carnegie Hall recital, he tries to buy every copy of a newspaper he knows has written a scathing review). There's a bit of unnecessary padding showing his relationship with another woman- because of Jenkins' illness, arrangements were made for Bayfield in what appears to be a kind of 'don't ask, don't tell'- which, for me, detracted from the main story, although there is a good turn by Rebecca Ferguson as 'the other woman'.
There's a lovely, gauche and very unassuming performance by The Big Bang Theory's Simon Helberg who plays Jenkins' accompianist Cosme McMoon. We see him auditioning for her at the beginning and is aghast at the first time he actually hears Jenkins sing. He is much more the voice of reason- although only ever to Bayfield, never to Jenkins herself. Yet, he remains loyal throughout despite his reservations.
It's a gentle, almost Sunday afternoon film- there's no strong swearing, no violence, no graphic sex- and veers between laugh-out-loud comedy and a touching drama about a woman who never let her lack of talent hold her back. Joyous.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tez
