Rare Beasts

Mandy (Billie Piper) is a struggling single mom in the modern world with a bad job and a troubled son. Her mother Marion (Kerry Fox) has been living with her for the last six years after being abandoned by her father Vic (David Thewlis). She starts dating co-worker Pete (Leo Bill) who is against the modern feminist world and is frustratingly bitter. She figures that he's going to rape her on their first date and so of course, she continues dating him.

I wanted to see why this is described as an anti-rom-com. Tom is an ugly hateful character. Sometimes, those misanthropes can be funny characters. Tom is never funny. There is no reason for Mandy to date him. He's one of those bad blind dates in a rom-com montage. We can laugh at his one horrible line but we don't have to spend the rest of the movie with him. Mandy is the classic pathetic single gal in the big world character. She's a staple in TV sitcoms and various rom-coms. Billie Piper is an appealing actress and her charisma overpowers any flaws. I see what's she's trying to do here. She's an older woman who lost her youth and feels her beauty fading away. She's overwhelmed by all sides. The question is what she's going to do with that character. This is her debut as a writer and as a director. It's interesting that she's choosing to do a dark underside interpretation of the standard rom-com. I don't think it achieves what it wants. It tries to do surreal but it comes too late. There are undeserved turns. It's not truly dark enough to be shocking or somehow worthy of discussion. It's definitely not funny despite some quirky turns. Billie Piper may have some interesting ideas but she's not experienced enough to pull it all together in a black comedy which is often a tough genre to get right. My one big suggestion is to make Pete her horrible husband from the start. She's stuck in a bad marriage and she needs to escape. In this movie, she doesn't need to escape as much as she needs to never get trapped in the first place.

I enjoyed the film, though definitely had overlaps with Billie Piper's series I Hate Suzie (which I must say I preferred). At times I couldn't work out if I was supposed to be rooting for her character and love interest to be together, and I found Pete's character rather confusing. But on the whole enjoyable and inventive, really intrigued to see what Billie comes up with next.

The writers and director went for bizarre with this one. I'm not a big fan of that approach to storytelling, and this was no exception. The weirdness overwhelmed the story and made me want to watch something less silly.

You'll know after the first five minutes whether or not this movie is for you.

I loved this movies chaos, social criticism and honestly. I found it to be very authentic and raw, which is just what I needed today. A movie for day when you're love life, or just life, is just too much. Billie Piper is an amazing actress.

While it is certainly different from what you could have expected, I could argue that it is not an entirely satisfying watch. Even though Billie Piper does a remarkable job behind and in front of the camera, the film overall feels like it lacks strenght in the right places. However I won't take away the fact that it takes quite a notable direction in storytelling, which can confuse some viewers, and fascinate others. Obviously this was Miss Piper's intention, but it was not entirely well-executed, in my view. Although the ending did leave me content somehow.

Even so, there are some marvellous performances to behold, such as the one coming from Billie Piper herself, along with Leo Bill, Kerry Fox and the always solid David Thewlis.

Interesting directing debut from Piper, and while not exent from criticism, it is a rightful start that could lead to more precisely elaborated and well-polished endeavours.