ALSO SHOWING
Solo: A Star Wars Story (12A)
As with the excellent Rogue One, the buzz around this Han Solo origins story has been terrible. The departure of original directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (The
Lego Movie) suggested risk and irreverence had been sacrificed for safety and profit, especially when Ron Howard replaced them. But after die-hard fans had Phantom
Menace-style meltdowns over The Last Jedi’s contentious treatment of Luke Skywalker, Howard’s hiring now seems like a canny move. He served his apprenticeship with George Lucas, after all, starring in
American Graffiti (alongside a very young Harrison Ford) and directing the Lucas-penned fantasy adventure film Willow (not a great movie, but still...). Given the way that these spinoff sagas seem intent on embracing the past rather than overturning it, a talented caretaker is maybe all that’s required to provide the requisite fan service demanded so vociferously online.
Solo: A Star Wars Story certainly does that. Want to know the origin of that surname? Check. Want to find out how he meets Chewbacca? Check. Want to see how he wins the Millennium Falcon? Check. Want a plot built around a throw-away line of dialogue in the original film? Double check. Indeed, in a film that also shows why Han always, always shoots first, there’s really not much to complain about here.
Even the casting is fine. Alden Ehrenreich does a fair job of capturing the spirit of Solo without doing a slavish impression of Ford, embracing the cocky attitude and the wry sense of humour to play the selfstyled scoundrel whose reluctance to admit he’s the good guy doesn’t stop his heroism shining through. He’s complimented by man of the moment Donald Glover, who delivers the film’s real star turn as the roguish, licentious Lando Calrissian.
Story-wise, it’s essentially an action-packed heist film, with setpieces that echo sequences from the original trilogy mixed in with daring escapades anew, all designed, like the aforementioned Rogue One, to join the dots between hitherto unexplored story points in the saga’s over-arching mythology. If if offers nothing new, it does what it does with craft and skill. It’s the cinematic equivalent – to paraphrase one character – of a comforting hug from a Wookiee.
On Chesil Beach (15)
Starring Saoirse Ronan and Billy Howle, this Ian Mcewan-scripted adaptation of his 2007 novella picks over the wreckage of a doomed marriage by jumping back-andforth in time to locate the cause and effect of its rapid dissolution, all the while using the coital calamity of the couple’s wedding night as sort of car-crash-in-slow-motion narrative through-line. Sadly, like the newly formalised relationship at its core, this approach doesn’t always make for the happiest of unions. The performances are fine, but it’s really just another stilted piece of prestige cinema.
The Breadwinner (12A)
Marking the third Oscar-nominated film in a row for Irish animation studio Cartoon Saloon (The Book of
Kells, Song of the Sea), this affecting adaptation of Deborah Ellis’s bestselling children’s novel – about a young Afghan girl forced to dress as a boy in order to earn a crust for her family in Taliban-controlled Kabul – does a good job of making an accessible family film about resilience in the face of terror.
Edie (12A)
Scottish-set tale of an octogenarian widower (Sheila Hancock) making up for lost time by travelling to the Highlands to climb Suilven. Though Hancock is good in the role, and Kevin Guthrie is quite charming as her young guide, the film’s faux crowdpleasing tone is condescending in ways its eponymous heroine surely wouldn’t tolerate. ■