`About a Boy' is simply the best movie I've seen in a very long time. It has a broad appeal, and will draw you in from the opening moment if you give it even the slightest of chances. I loved the book and was wary, like so many others, of how the adaptation would work. Well, they did a brilliant job, beginning with the casting of Hugh Grant.
I'm not really a fan of Grant: sure he was entertaining in Four Weddings, but his stock, foppish English-upper-class act got stale very quickly. Clearly he allowed himself to be stereotyped too early in his career. Well it seems as though he's turned a corner with the role of Will in `About a Boy.' Gone (or at least muted) are the mannerisms that I used to find annoying. Here he uses his hands, eyes and facial expressions in more subtle ways, and to great effect. He also plays a much more realistic, flawed character and believably so. From now on I think the name Hugh Grant will draw me to movies rather than put me off them.
What can I say about Nicholas Hoult as Marcus except to echo what so many others have said what an astoundingly convincing performance! He conveys very well the innocent honesty of a boy forced to grow up too fast in a world with which he isn't really in synch. He was aggravating when the plot called for it, tight-lipped at the right times, awkward in the best traditions of early adolescence, winning and off-putting like any youngster (or adult for that matter). He impressed me most in his interactions with his screen mother, in the scene where he explains to Will in a heartbreakingly matter-of-fact tone how he copes with his misfit existence, and in his encounter with Rachel's son Ali. In fact I don't think he puts a foot wrong in the whole movie. In my opinion Nicholas Hoult absolutely nailed the character.
Toni Collette and Rachel Weisz do wonders with roles that are, admittedly, under-written. Let's face it, `About a Boy' is the Will (& Marcus) Show. That's just how Hornby wrote it. But both actresses give their characters as much depth as the movie's constraints allow. Collette's Fiona is perhaps an unlikely portrait of the average single mother suffering from mental illness, but she convinces us because she is so sincere in a movie with so many laughs, you can't help feeling moved by her tears or her expressions of affection for her son. And Weisz, despite having an even smaller part, is no less convincing in her interactions with Hugh Grant's character.
Add to the mix Augustus Prew's brief but extraordinary performance as Ali and the sweet and sour character of Ellie so ably performed by Nat Gastiain Tena, then you have perhaps the best ensemble cast in any movie made so far this year, and perhaps the best we're likely to see in all of 2002!
I'm not really a fan of Grant: sure he was entertaining in Four Weddings, but his stock, foppish English-upper-class act got stale very quickly. Clearly he allowed himself to be stereotyped too early in his career. Well it seems as though he's turned a corner with the role of Will in `About a Boy.' Gone (or at least muted) are the mannerisms that I used to find annoying. Here he uses his hands, eyes and facial expressions in more subtle ways, and to great effect. He also plays a much more realistic, flawed character and believably so. From now on I think the name Hugh Grant will draw me to movies rather than put me off them.
What can I say about Nicholas Hoult as Marcus except to echo what so many others have said what an astoundingly convincing performance! He conveys very well the innocent honesty of a boy forced to grow up too fast in a world with which he isn't really in synch. He was aggravating when the plot called for it, tight-lipped at the right times, awkward in the best traditions of early adolescence, winning and off-putting like any youngster (or adult for that matter). He impressed me most in his interactions with his screen mother, in the scene where he explains to Will in a heartbreakingly matter-of-fact tone how he copes with his misfit existence, and in his encounter with Rachel's son Ali. In fact I don't think he puts a foot wrong in the whole movie. In my opinion Nicholas Hoult absolutely nailed the character.
Toni Collette and Rachel Weisz do wonders with roles that are, admittedly, under-written. Let's face it, `About a Boy' is the Will (& Marcus) Show. That's just how Hornby wrote it. But both actresses give their characters as much depth as the movie's constraints allow. Collette's Fiona is perhaps an unlikely portrait of the average single mother suffering from mental illness, but she convinces us because she is so sincere in a movie with so many laughs, you can't help feeling moved by her tears or her expressions of affection for her son. And Weisz, despite having an even smaller part, is no less convincing in her interactions with Hugh Grant's character.
Add to the mix Augustus Prew's brief but extraordinary performance as Ali and the sweet and sour character of Ellie so ably performed by Nat Gastiain Tena, then you have perhaps the best ensemble cast in any movie made so far this year, and perhaps the best we're likely to see in all of 2002!