Film Review of the Week

Adventure

The Magic Faraway Tree (U)

Review: Do you believe in magic? You may do after almost two delightful hours in the company of director Ben Gregor’s rambunctious family-oriented adventure, adapted by screenwriter Simon Farnaby from Enid Blyton’s popular series of books. A briskly paced and broadly comic odyssey laden with special effects-bedazzled flourishes conceals well-earned lump-in-throat payoffs that double down on a wholesome core message about a united family overcoming adversity.

Smart fridge designer Polly Thompson (Claire Foy) resigns from her job for refusing to violate customers’ privacy with a hidden camera embedded in the appliance’s door. She moves to the countryside with husband Tim (Andrew Garfield) and their three children, Beth (Delilah Bennett-Cardy), Fran (Billie Gadsdon) and Joe (Phoenix Laroche), to realise dad’s long-cherished dream of making fresh tomato sauce. The family pays £20,000 for a tumbledown barn belonging to a farmer (Simon Farnaby) and his wife (Claire Keelan) without wifi or modern conveniences (including electricity). The children are apoplectic and sullen and sarcastic, and Beth sends a handwritten SOS to her wealthy maternal grandmother (Jennifer Saunders) to finance her escape from the fresh air and social media-free serenity.

Meanwhile, Fran follows instructions inside a handwritten note to ascend an enchanted tree, which is home to fairy Silky (Nicola Coughlan) and her magical friends Moonface (Nonso Anozie), Dame Washalot (Jessica Gunning), Saucepan Man (Dustin Demri-Burns), Mr Watzisname (Oliver Chris) and Angry Pixie (Hiran Abeysekera). They accompany Fran on magical adventures that could heal her broken family… presuming they avoid falling into the clutches of villainous Dame Snap (Rebecca Ferguson).

The Magic Faraway Tree fizzes and pops with sugary sweetness like a mouthful of flying saucer sweets, which take flight on screen when Fran indulges her confectionery dreams in the Land of Goodies. Young stars Bennett-Cardy, Gadsdon and Laroche warmly embrace their character stereotypes and provide just the right amount of pluck to take charge of the film’s frenetic final act. Foy and particularly Garfield treat their roles with heartfelt sincerity amid the tomfoolery and carefully choreographed chaos. Screenwriter Farnaby concentrates on the first book in Blyton’s series – The Enchanted Wood, first published in 1939 – and updates the source material to a fanciful vision of the present day that matches the tone of his previous work co-writing Paddington 2 and Wonka.

He distributes sparkling one-liners evenly among the ensemble cast and gets considerable mileage out of the running joke about Saucepan Man’s cookware-impaired hearing. However, Beth’s redemption happens so quickly audiences might experience whiplash, and a key sequence, which the children claim will only take a couple of hours to a tight deadline, clearly requires considerably longer without any logical and obvious repercussions. That’s when you have to consciously uncouple from common sense and truly believe in magic.

Comedy

Splitsville (15)

Review: Variety is the spice of a miserable, self-destructive life. That’s one takeaway from this unromantic comedy directed by Michael Angelo Covino and co-written by Kyle Marvin, which oscillates between two married couples, whose seemingly happy pairings are unravelling at different speeds. The male writers and stars embrace full-frontal nudity with unrestrained gusto – predominantly for giggles – which becomes a pointed metaphor for their characters letting everything hang out. It’s no surprise when something precious gets snagged in a hastily-tugged zipper.

A bizarre car accident provides the unlikely catalyst for Ashley (Adria Arjona) to ask her shell-shocked husband Carey (Marvin) for a divorce. He wallows in self-denial, offering to forgive her cheating, and seeks refuge with good friends Julie (Dakota Johnson) and Paul (Covino), who reveal that they are in an open marriage and this arrangement has kept their relationship afloat. “You two could sleep together and it wouldn’t bother me”, casually observes Paul as the trio share drinks on a sofa.

Paul is called away to attend to an urgent business matter in Manhattan, which Julie believes is an excuse for her husband to enjoy one of their sanctioned dalliances. He leaves behind his wife and Carey to deal with a stressful incident involving a stolen jet ski. Once the adrenaline rush abates, Carey and Julie take Paul at his word and have sex. Once Paul returns from New York and learns how open his wife has been with their good friend, seeds of jealousy take root and Julie tries in vain to prevent full-blown civil war between the two men. Temporarily admitting defeat, Paul concedes that Carey is a great guy and his wife could do worse. “I have,” she observes.

Splitsville is a wilfully unconventional snapshot of contemporary, sex-positive relationships, which invites characters to have their cakes and eat them … until everyone realises they have bitten off more than they can comfortably chew. Covino and Marvin are good friends off screen and that familiarity feeds their on-screen dynamic, particularly when the actors perform their own messy fight scene without any stunt doubles, pile-driving each other through wooden furniture or hitting each other for real when a clever camera can’t conceal the blow landing.

Laughs are gentle but frequent in a freewheeling script that navigates the tangled messes of two relationships without resorting to a glut of genre cliches. Some on-screen partner permutations are more endearing than others but film-makers take great delight in pushing characters’ boundaries, even when it doesn’t make sense for them to be forgiving, forgetting or repeating past mistakes.

Horror

They Will Kill You (15)

Review: Taking its provocative title from a handwritten message, which has been concealed from prying eyes, They Will Kill You is a bonkers battle royale staged almost entirely inside a high-rise apartment block dating back to 1923. An occult-themed etching hangs above the main doorway, teasing the dark machinations of a script co-written by director Kirill Sokolov and Alex Litvak that clutters the screen with glistening innards and freshly amputated limbs.

Asia Reaves (Zazie Beetz) fails to protect her younger sister Maria (Myha’la) from their controlling and abusive father. She serves time behind bars for shooting the old man during an escape bid and emerges 10 years later with a renewed sense of purpose, laser-focused on atoning for sins of the past and reuniting her fractured family. The resourceful ex-con secures employment as a housemaid at the Virgil, one of the most exclusive residences in New York City. Clientele expect impeccable service and absolute discretion so mobile phones are surrendered at the door to superintendent Lily (Patricia Arquette) to guarantee the privacy of current residents including beauty serum maven Sharon (Heather Graham) and cocktail-swigging Kevin (Tom Felton).

On her first night at the Virgil, Asia discovers the dark secrets that fester behind the heavily fortified entrance and she calls upon fighting skills learnt in prison to battle her way through bedrooms, corridors and conference areas. “The building was designed to be a deathtrap,” confides an unlikely ally. Against overwhelming odds, Asia arms herself with a shotgun, machete and improvised weaponry to inflict maximum damage and hopefully find an escape route.

They Will Kill You is a gleefully gore-slathered action comedy, which accelerates sharply into top gear with the first bout of hand-to-hand combat. Director Sokolov sustains the breathless, frenetic pacing that proves exhausting as much for us as Beetz’s blood-smeared avenging angel. Thank heavens for a comparatively brief running time of 94 minutes. Fight choreography draws obvious comparisons to John Wick for bruising, bone-crunching intensity. The camera swoops and whirls around characters as blades lop off appendages or inflict severe wounds. Drenched in increasing amounts of viscera and gore, Beetz slashes, stabs and kicks with unbridled ferocity and doesn’t think twice about punching a meddlesome minor in the face.

A ghoulish and giggleworthy set piece with a severed eyeball is delivered with panache, paying tribute to a stomach-churning gag from Sam Raimi’s horror sequel Evil Dead II. There is a heavy reliance in Sokolov’s picture on practical special effects with some digital trickery, particularly in a final showdown that ramps up the absurdity past a point of no sensible return. Substance is a sacrificial lamb throughout, chained at the altar of eye-popping style to sate the diabolical thirsts of Sokolov and co-writer Litvak. They will bludgeon you.