A Wonderful World: A Long Way Down?

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Film review of ‘A Long Way Down’

SPOILER ALERT!

Based on the novel by Nick Hornby four people dissuade one another’s suicide attempts on New Year’s Eve from London’s tallest tower block.

More like a long way to the credits! Pierce Brosnan and co-star Toni Collette’s new film ‘A Long Way Down’ was a sore shocker and bitter disappointment. From each point of view this desperately trying to be bitter-sweet ‘comedy’ has totally lost the plot – much like its characters! Jess (Imogen Poots) – the daughter of a politician with ‘invisible’-sister trouble is entirely thoughtless as she starts off the film based on Nick Hornby’s 2005 Novel by uncaringly approaching delicate subjects such as mental illness, cancer, drug addiction and sex abuse with about as much compassion as a school bully. I can’t say I’ve read Hornby’s book but I hope he handled these issues better than this – the film made the issues seem flippant and forgetful. Her character unfortunately barely diluted Breaking Bad star, Aaron Paul’s offensive JJ. Little do we know about his real reasons for suicide apart from of course his failed dreams of a 'grunge' band which audiences only discover after his bogus brain cancer ploy – how heart warming! Furthermore, the whole movie felt distinctly unrealistic which was a complete disappointment after high expectations from ‘About a Boy’ – this should have only come out on DVD or better yet some random sky channel at 2am, not a film supposedly fit for cinemas with a fee of £7.90! (Cineworld)

One point that must be made however, is the film must somewhat be congratulated on finally pulling together a half-decent, minor, touching storyline of Maureen’s (Toni Collette) cerebral palsy sick son – a true wave of sympathy washed over the cinema’s audience I’m sure as we glimpsed a look into how hard carer’s lives are and their unrelenting generosity and kindness. Although I’m not too sure what real-life carers would think of this section of the plot – was it truly touching or unrealistic and insensitive like the rest of the film?

On the other hand, we still don’t know why she (or the others for that matter) were up on the roof in the first place – was JJ in fact just delivering pizzas (another pathetic attempt at ‘comedy’) as he sure didn’t have brain cancer? Maureen said she just felt ‘helpless’ – about what? (after finding out it’s not her son!) and Jess – was it your sister or just media pressure and a desperate cry for attention? At least with Martin (Brosnan’s character) it was obvious yet still not enough to pull the heart strings as he indelicately tries to defend his raping of a 15 year old girl (thinking of the Savile cases, this is a poorly picked film...at anytime, let alone now!) through sympathy calls of divorce, being fired and being alone and humiliated – these things can happen to other people without the stimulus of such a disgusting crime and they don’t come to this selfish character’s conclusion...but then we’re supposed to feel sorry for him – I can see now why they’ve branded this as a comedy – the plot’s a total joke!

You never know, I may be totally missing the point here in the fact that someone who is that desperate may never feel ‘ok’ to tell anyone about the real reasons that drive them to their decision. Maybe that was the point of this ludicrous film although from the trailer I feel exuberantly mislead if this is the case. Forget promises of a heart-warming tale of four strangers who help and support each other and know this bizarre and jumbled up film is hardly worth any credit at all. With my only question being: Why did these brilliant actors and actresses sign onto the unnerving project in the first place?

Overall: one star.

A disappointment at best but thank God for at least one vaguely touching storyline despite the unrealistic nature of this bizarre film.