Collateral Beauty (12A)
one star
Dir: David Frankel
With: Keira Knightley, Will Smith
Runtime: 97 minutes
EVEN by the standards of Christmas movies, which rarely stint on the schmaltz, David Frankel’s wannabe tear jerker is an extravaganza of bad taste. Will Smith plays Howard, a New York ad agency boss who goes from Mad Man to Sad Man after his life takes a dreadful turn. His partners, who include Ed Norton and Kate Winslet, opt to take drastic action to snap Howard out of his emotional coma, and by “drastic” I mean utterly unbelievable and an insult to the intelligence of an amoeba. Contrived, annoying silly, and featuring some ripe acting from Smith, this is a Christmas movie turkey with all the starry trimmings.
Ballerina (U)
three stars
Dirs: Eric Warin, Eric Summer
Voices: Elle Fanning, Dane DeHaan
Runtime: 89 minutes
THE title of this French animation will be catnip to a certain demographic - young, fond of a tutu, dreams of Swan Lake in their hearts. If you know someone like that, there is pleasure to be had from the tale of Felicie who flees with her friend, Victor, from an orphanage in the sticks to Paris. The story is all over the shop in terms of language and costume, with the likes of denim shorts and Americanisms finding their way into 1879 Paris, and there is a horribly cheesy soundtrack complete with warbling about fulfilling your dreams, etc. But hey, there are tutus.
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