Heartfelt story of music giants
TRAGEDY UNDERLINES TALE OF THE BEE GEES’ REMARKABLE LEGACY
THE BEE GEES: HOW CAN YOU MEND A BROKEN HEART (M)
Director: Frank Marshall (Congo)
Starring: Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb.
Rating: ★★★★
High notes, low times and a sound legacy
The moment when your heart will break in the excellent new music documentary, How Can You Mend a Broken Heart, comes at the very close.
After reliving all the fame, fortune, triumph and tragedy experienced by The Bee Gees across a long and exemplary career, the group’s main singer-songwriter, Barry Gibb, quietly puts all we have seen into the most personal, poignant context: “I would give it all up — the hit songs, everything — if I could have my brothers back with me.”
With twin younger siblings Robin and Maurice long gone — preceded by the sad demise of the trio’s “baby” brother, Andy — it is now left to Barry Gibb to tell the remarkable story of The Bee Gees for one last, definitive time.
While the boys’ formative years as British immigrants living in Brisbane are glossed over rather quickly, it is only because there is so much rich and revealing ground to cover here.
The long chain of hits racked up during their first burst of fame while based in late-60s London — such as Spicks and Specks, Words, New York Mining Disaster 1941, I Started a Joke and Massachusetts — forms a body of work most bands would gladly settle for.
However, phase two in the US a decade later triggered an unprecedented global chart domination that makes The Bee Gees one of the true alltime greats of popular music.
The tracks composed by the Gibbs for the soundtrack to Saturday Night Fever — spearheaded by the incomparable Stayin’ Alive — were dashed off in just over a fortnight. Months later, these songs formed the nucleus of what was then the highestselling album in recorded history. Just as crucially, this success and its inextricable links to disco music meant a sudden and irreversible downfall was soon on the cards for the Brothers Gibb.
This is a fascinating yarn, told in a polished, yet most astute manner by people with the right understanding of how unique The Bee Gees remain.
How Can You Mend a Broken Heart now showing in General Release for a limited season
LET HIM GO (M)
Rating: ★★★☆
General release
The last time we saw Kevin Costner and Diane Lane together on the big screen was as Clark Kent’s parents in the Superman flick, Man of Steel. Now the veteran stars are reunited to play vigilante grandparents in what turns out to be a very solid genre thriller set in the American west in the early 60s. Costner’s George is a retired lawman, Lane’s Margaret his resourceful wife.
They make a pact to not only ascertain the exact whereabouts of their lost grandson, but also haul him back to a safe place his own mother and her new husband are in no shape to provide. A long and worrying journey interstate puts George and Margaret on a collision course with a set of outlaw in-laws who will not relinquish their grip on the child, and will do anything to keep it that way. Pacing and performances (especially Lesley Manville as the evil backwoods matriarch who is Margaret’s polar opposite) remain in the right zone throughout here, even if the storytelling sometimes lacks in clarity. Based on the Larry Watson novel.
HAPPIEST SEASON (M)
Rating:★★★
General release
This Christmas-themed romcom does the Decemberreunion-of-a-dysfunctionalfamily thing in a friendly and familiar way.
With the exception of one key element, you are right to assume you have seen and heard all this before. Doesn’t mean you won’t respond positively to Happiest Season, however. Far from it. This sprightly yarn of a same-sex couple trying to keep their relationship under wraps until the holidays are over is charming middle-of-the-road fare. Harper (Mackenzie Davis) does not wish to spend Christmas apart from girlfriend Abby (Kristen Stewart) so hauls her home to her family by posing as her “roommate”. Much tension and an above-average number of laughs are drawn from whether Harper and Abby can keep their bond closeted for a week. Adding further complications are Harper’s control-freak mother (Mary Steenburgen), politically ambitious father (Victor Garber), and ex (Aubrey Plaza). That wonderful Schitt’s Creek scene-stealer Dan Levy disrupts the predictable proceedings when required.