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Reviews
La famille Bélier (2014)
You will laugh and you will definitely cry!
I loved this film - it was absolutely charming, funny and moving. The Belier family are farmers and Mum, Dad and younger brother are all deaf, daughter Paula being their ears and mouth in the outside world. They rely on her, perhaps too much and, for any parent whose children are on the cusp of flying the nest, you feel for both Paula who wants to fly and her family who are afraid to let her go and to face the world without her.......Karin Viard and Francois Damiens portray Mr and Mme Belier so convincingly it's hard to believe that neither of them are deaf - although Mme Belier does strike me as rather too glamorous to be a farmer's wife (compared to farmers' wives that one meets in my part of rural France). Louane Emera (a former contestant on the French version of 'The Voice') plays a typical adolescent on the cusp of adulthood, wanting to find her own way and her own (singing) voice, making a break away from a loving and sometimes stifling family home and taking the first steps of independence.......
Queen & Country (2014)
Disappointing sequel...
Queen and Country is set after the end of 2nd World War and in the time of compulsory military service. In short, not a lot happens....disappointingly so, especially if you enjoyed John Boorman's autobiographical account of his London childhood during the war. Having moved to Pharoah's Island on the Thames near Shepperton, the film leaps forward to the mid 1950's with Bill Rohan leaving his idyllic family home to being called up for military service. Bookish and sensitive, he is an engaging young man and is beautifully played by Callum Turner. Ever on the fringe of being sent to Korea, Rohan is expected to train new recruits how to type. He falls in love, is thwarted in love, proves to be a loyal friend to the bizarrely-accented Percy (Texas-born actor Caleb Landry Jones - that explains that then!) then finally falls in love with the right girl and presumably goes on to become a famous film director......