Le Week-end!!!!

Le Week-end.

What has been a flurry of teenage rom-coms featuring high profile stars it is getting abit saturated, the latest release of Enough Said has brought forward a love story of the older generation. Le-Weekend is a love story for the much older generation in every greatest respect.

Focusing on an ageing sixty year old couple, Nick (Jim Broadbent) and Meg Burrows (Lindsay Duncan) they are to celebrate what is their thirty year wedding anniversary in the very place they honeymooned, Paris.

With Nick booking what looks like the cheapest hotel in Paris Meg takes the initiative to book into something a little more comfier and cleaner to celebrate their wedding anniversary. Wandering around Paris the couple sit in bars drinking, go to expensive restaurants and try to enjoy each others company. 

On the surface the couple look happy but soon enough you see the little flaws and cracks in their long standing relationship. Meg says to Nick "once the kids have gone what will become of us" clearly showing that she has her doubts as to what their future will hold. Slight digs and laughter at each others misfortunes are what keep the couple happy, tring to rekindle their love they run from restaurants without paying, run in the road and generally go back to what they were thirty years ago .

Constantly questioning each other they bump into one of Nick's old students Morgan (Jeff Goldblum) who is always impressed by Nick and has the typical American attitude positive attitude about everything. With their relationship on the rocks and both of them having to deal with their potential future they have alot to think about. 

For what is another rom-com for the older generation it's refreshing and also enlightening to see what happens between a married couple of thirty years, the problems they go through and how they deal with life. What is shown on trailers is all happy is quite the opposite when you watch the whole film, at times dark themes run through some of the scenes. Broadbent and Duncan are great on screen together and at times show a more natural connection and relationship between each other showing their years of acting they have mastered how to become a character. 

A funny, interesting and enlightening film that shows perfectly what an older couple go through after the kids have up and left and they're left with just each others company.

7/10.

What Maisie Knew!!!!

What Maisie Knew.

A film that really impressed me and also hit me emotionally is 'What Maisie Knew', set in New York we first see Maisie's (Onata Aprile) parents arguing over who has custody over their daughter. As Susanna (Jullieanne Moore) and Beale (Steve Coogan) argue over their daughter Maisie just gets on with things, answering the door to the pizza man and paying him you can tell she's become an independent girl. 

As Susanna hangs out with her rock band friends and records new music in the studio Maisie is left again to her own devices and soon enough a nanny arrives, Margo (Joanna Vanderham) is blonde and beautiful and the perfect companion for Maisie. Being picked up and carted backwards and forwards to her mum and dad's houses Maisie just takes it all in and acts like a child. As the two parents still fight over their daughter they soon enough get married to help stabilise their appeal for full custody of Maisie. 

With Susanna now married to Lincoln (Alexander Skarsgard) and Beale married to nanny Margo the two couples have everything they could want. With Susanna going away on tour and Beale flying back and forth between New York and London both parents never truly connect with their daughter who they fought so much for. Soon enough Maisie and Lincoln strike up a relationship and the pair start to enjoy themselves despite the drama happening between his new wife and Maisie's father. 

As she soon enough is let down by both her parents and both their marriages have broken down Maisie is left stranded and it is the parents ex partners who have to pick her back up. As Margo takes her off to a remote destination she finally has the stability that she has always needed, Lincoln soon arrives and starts up a relationship with Margo. As the three come together to form a little family it shows at how happy Maisie can be when she has that loving, caring, stable life. 

The film has a great narrative that runs through it, from the chopping and changing of her parents love lives it's surprising that true happiness comes from two non paternal adults. Little scenes that show how much both parents don't know their daughter are also shown, Beale getting Margo to decorate Maisie's room shows he doesn't know his own daughter. Susanna walking in on Margo helping Maisie pick out what clothes to wear and just saying "put that on come on we have to go" shows she spends no time with her daughter or even care. 

Harsh scene's where Susanna says to her own daughter "I married Lincoln for you" shows she will do anything to gain custody of her daughter which includes marrying someone Maisie has never met or knows. At times it is heart breaking to see Maisie go through so much in her life because of her parents, it makes you think that some children will go through this in their life which is quite sad.

For a film I thought I would not like I really was sucked into the film and felt every little thing that Maisie went through, Onata Aprile has to be the cutest little girl I've seen on screen in recent years, I really hope she carries on with acting and becomes the next Drew Barrymore as she plays Maisie flawlessly and really brings joy, sadness and laughter to the screen with ease. A great emotional film for a topic that has become so common nowadays.

9/10.