5 stars
Stars: James Purefoy, Kevin McKidd, Tom Hollander, Jennifer Ehle,
Hugo Weaving, Julie Graham, Christopher Fulford
Director: Rose Troche
Screenplay: Robert Farrar
Certificate: 15
Distributor: Alliance
Running Time: 1hr 36 minutes
Opening Date: April 9
Hip comedy of gender matters.
The winner of the Audience Award for new British cinema at the last London Film Festival, the sexual identities of a group of late twenty something Londoners come under glorious scrutiny in this lid-blowing comedy from Go Fish's Rose Troche.
Leo (McKidd) is a regular nice guy who has a good life professionally but is aching for a new love. He shares a flat with Darren (Hollander), a raging queen who enjoys energetic romps with Jeremy (Weaving), an estate qgent who uses the houses he's supposed to be selling for their afternoons of delight.
Leo works for Adam (Fulford) who invites him to join his painfully heterosexual men's support group run by Simon Callow. After a couple of meetings Leo upsets the balance by blurting out that he actually fancies one of the other group members, the gorgeous Brendan (Purefoy) who is in the middle of breaking-up with his long-standing girlfriend (Ehle).
During a camping weekend in the woods on the quest for their inner wild men selves (which they fail to find), Leo and Brendan discover their inner more sensitive selves.
This is a warm and worldly-wise that makes This Year's Love taste like stale cake. By no means shackled to the topic of sexual identity, it does, however, revolved bewitchingly around it, taking mischievous and affectionate looks at the fluid nature of sexuality and the underlying assumptions we have about it.
Cast with a brilliant array of talent - McKidd from Trainspotting, Hollander from Martha Meet Frank..., Purefoy from A Dance to the Music of Time - there's an added bonus of the irrestible pairing of Callow and Harriet Walter as Keith and Sybil, eccentric guardians of the support group.
Bedrooms and Hallways is a laughing-out-loud funny with a cracking soundtrack and eye-catching design, and an overt love of life. The end result is an hour-and-a-half of pure joy and should not be missed!
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