Happy-Go-Lucky

HAPPY- GO - LUCKY (2008) *** Sally Hawkins, Eddie Marsan, Alexis Zegerman, Samuel Roukin, Karina Fernandez, Kate O'Flynn, Sylvestra Le Touzel, Caroline Martin, Oliver Maltman, Sarah Niles. Hawkins gives an Oscar worthy performance as the titular "Poppy" Cross, an indefatigably jocular Brit school teacher, who positively embues the word, good-hearted, whose joyful nature gets the best of her as she takes on all her social pitfalls and daily set-backs with a smile on her face and a joke to break the heartache deep under-the-surface. Acclaimed English filmmaker Mike Leigh allows his talent to showcase her genuine achievement in making Poppy a flesh-and-blood character and Hawkins' tightrope balance from splendid to borderline annoying is a dizzying accomplishment. Equally good is Marsan as Poppy's complete antithesis, a rage-aholic driving instructor whose seething anger cannot betray his true emotions (or can they)? A small gem of a film.

ACTING: Great, everyone chipped in superbly (I wouldn't like to single anyone out) even though it seemed on occasion that the director is abusing them; DIRECTION: False Modesty; STORY: Desperate grab at irony and identification from people who THINK they know people. Miserable at best. The film keeps you going by making you think it has actually got something of importance to say to anyone above 12. What a let-down the ending is; Gets 4 due to the actors only - worth a watch, if only to deconstruct it afterwards.

Very disappointing. If only the film was as good as its trailer. The film has many scenes and character strands that go nowhere and add little, or nothing, to the film and plot. The film is slow and meanders, and really winds up going nowhere. Most stories have a beginning, middle, and end, but this one felt like mostly middle, with a little bit of beginning. Of all the various sub-plots and characters introduced by those sub-plots, only two seemed to have any substance. Many of the others could have hit the cutting room floor and the movie would not have suffered in any way. On the other hand, perhaps some important sub-plots were edited out that may have otherwise explained the character and story and allowed its overall plot to make more sense and have more value.

Quite the B-side to Naked. The two, in combination, are like having sardines for lunch and then following them up with a slice of peach cobbler. I rather liked the sardines, I just can't believe they came out of the same oven as the cobbler. It's impressive how Mike Leigh can cook up such a wide range of philosophical characters and somehow make them all seem authentic and appealing.

... because I only made it about 20 minutes. I can't give this an honest review, because it may have shocked me and gotten better... but I don't think so. Poppy was beyond annoying, and the introduction of her left so little hope for the rest of the movie that I felt compelled to share my reaction here. Sorry if you enjoyed it... please let me know if it's worth giving it a few more minutes.. Very disappointing and I wouldn't suggest paying anything for this, although if you happen to see it for free somewhere let me know what you think.

Boring... A bad English imitation of Amelie... Why, oh why?? I wanted so much to like this movie... A light goofy protagonist, really annoying! Constantly saying silly comments with chuckles... How could anyone mistake her continuous chattering for humour? I was fooling myself that it would get better, but my patience was over and had to stop the movie in the middle, and almost meditate to forget how annoyed I was... I wouldn't recommend this film to anybody. I am surprised that it received some good reviews... I really like Mike Leigh, but I guess no one is perfect!

Who can say boring and dull really fast? How happy can people be? Too flippin happy. I was looking for something that was at least a touch depress...but it just didn't happen. The depressing part is that everybody is just too happy. No explosions, no mafia hit men, no car chases or space aliens blasting the world away. Just happy people that seemed like they smoked too much weed when they were 14 and never exhaled. That's about it. Not a memorable movie...but a glorious waste of time.

An interesting movie. on the surface it appears to be about 2 pointless months from the life of the most irritating woman in the world. However to the educated eye this is actually a low key SciFi psychodrama. Poppy is clearly a escaped Replicant trying to make a life for itself on London. However time and again her off kilter physical, emotional and social response's endanger her cover. If she were in the desert, and saw a tortoise lying on its back, struggling, she'd not help-- she would try to jolly it along. Voight-Kampff, fail in one. Its either that or I have wasted two hours of my life... I prefer my version on the film.