ALL MY FRIENDS HATE ME
Cert 15 ★★★★
In cinemas now
Fans of Richard Curtis’s romcoms will find the set-up of this Brit flick deceptively familiar.
Reformed party animal Pete
(Tom Stourton) arrives in Devon to celebrate his birthday with his uni chums in the stately home of his old best pal George (Joshua McGuire).
They are all terribly posh and
Pete thinks he may have outgrown them. But his new down-to-earth girlfriend Sonia (Charly Clive) will only join them on the second day of the celebrations. Until then, he’ll have to endure an awkward reunion with George and his wife Fig (Georgina Campbell), coke-addled Archie
(Graham Dickson), and Pete’s suicidal ex Claire (Antonia Clarke).
A tradition (which the reformed Pete now remembers finding “demeaning”) dictates that the gang invites a “random” outsider. This time, the slot is filled by Harry (Dustin
Demri-Burns), a “local” they found in the village pub.
Harry starts making what sound like veiled digs at Pete from the off and keeps scribbling in a notepad. And why do his friends find Harry so hilarious? Suspicion begins to take root. Is this an elaborate prank? Does everybody secretly hate him?
Sharp lines are delivered with perfect timing. The writers, actor Tom Stourton and Tom Palmer, met at Eton and this takedown of the upper classes feels like an inside job.
Still, you’ll be glad to see the end credits and I imagine the filmmakers wouldn’t want it any other way. This comedy has the creeping menace of a horror film and all the jokes are precision engineered to produce blood-curdling cringes.