BritMum’s Monthly Film Reviews: What’s on DVD

Vicki Psarias is the blogger Honest Mum. Psarias is an award winning writer/director winning the 30 Under 30 Square Mile London Talent Award, The Channel 4 4Talent Award for Best Filmmaker amongst many Best Director film festival awards from LA to India. Vicki features in the Guardian’s Courvoisieur Future 500 and was highly commended at the Red Magazine Red Hot Women Awards for her writing and directing work. To read her blog, the honest and funny musings of a filmmaker and first time mother  please go to: http://www.honestmum.com. 

Her film website is www.vpsarias.co.uk. Vicki is former Editor of the Film & Festivals Magazine.

Follow Vicki on Twitter @HonestMummy and @VickiFilm

Getting to the movies is hard enough so here’s my round up of what’s hot and what’s not on dvd. Enjoy

My Week with Marilyn:

Told from the perspective of an assistant director Colin Clark who spent a week with Marilyn at Pinewood Studios when she made The Price and the Showgirl with Sir Laurence Olivier  in 1956, this movie divided me. On the one hand, I felt underwhelmed whiles watching but was deeply affected later, mesmerised by Michelle Williams’ Oscar worthy performance. Two stars, clashing on set: Marilyn Monroe and Sir Laurence left MM distraught and seeking solace in the arms of young Colin, a junior on set: their brief time together touching his life forever. Williams isn’t the double of Marilyn but I struggled to think of anyone else great enough to fill the icon’s boots. Twitter raised suggestions of Scarlett Johannsen? Kenneth Branagh offers up an insecure, patronising Olivier, making his directorial debut on the movie starring Marilyn raising tension on set as the twosome battled to make a movie together. A worthwhile watch but I did expect greater elegance and star quality from the set design and direction.

Rating: 7/10

I Don’t Know How She Does It:

Sarah Jessica Parker takes the lead in this frothy, substandard adaptation from the British best seller about a career woman juggling a family and life as a trader. Despite yearning for an intelligent engrossing film about the demands of motherhood (and not finding it here) I did surprise myself by crying during this movie. A lot. Could be my pregnancy. Might just be that some of the themes resonated. Decide for yourself.

Rating: 6/10

Change Up:

Best friends Mitch (Ryan Reynolds) and Dave (Jason Bateman) were once inseparable but times are a-changing. Dave, an in demand lawyer, husband and father of 3, Mitch a childlike, sex addict in desperate need to grow up find themselves swapping bodies after a freak incident with a water fountain. Yes really. A silly, high concept movie with too much swearing for my liking, the two men do spark off one another but overall I wanted my two hours back.

Rating 5/10

Swinging with the Finkels:

The worst movie I’ve seen this year, this dismally written film about a couple reaching the 7 year itch, is an embarrassment to the British film industry. I’m sure Martin Freeman, Mandy Moore and Melissa George cursed the day they agreed to this movie. Watch with caution.

Rating 0/10

The Inbetweeners Movie:

A huge fan of the tv series, I was disappointed to find the film rehashed old jokes as the four school friends take a trip to Malia with the usual sexual disappointments and juvenile antics they’re famous for. Great if you missed the series as laughs come thick and fast but you might switch over if you’ve seen it all before. Reminded me of my first teen holiday abroad and why I’m glad I never married my childhood sweetheart.

Rating 6/10