Last weekend our local Blockbusters had an offer of four DVDs for four nights for £10. Marian and I had already decided that we would choose one each for our weekend chill out, so we chose Slumdog Millionaire, The Secret Life of Bees, Changeling and The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas. For once we enjoyed each film; often we feel thoroughly downhearted at the depressing plot or lack of hope or redemption in recent stories. Not that these were particularly hope filled. Both Slumdog and Bees were more optimistic and fanciful than hopeful. Changeling and The Boy raised interesting questions – the first in a long series of US navel gazing about internal corruption and the second about the consequences to oneself of one’s own choices for evil. If you only want a superficial, unrealistically happy film that skirts real questions of life and morality, choose Mamma Mia. Or a thousand others. Meanwhile, I’d recommend these four.
15 July, 2009