Overboard Cert 12A 1hr 52mins
Overboard is a comedy about a thoroughly spoilt and hugely wealthy yacht-owner who falls off their boat one night, wakes up in hospital with amnesia and is then picked up by someone claiming to be their spouse but who is actually intent on both revenge and teaching a few important life-lessons along the way. Sound familiar?
Well, it should as it’s a remake of the 1987 film of the same name that starred Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell. It’s generally considered to be amusing, well-worked, classy fun. The 2018 remake? Not so much.
For its new outing, it has been given a 21st-century makeover. The gender roles have been reversed and a strong Hispanic theme introduced that may play well in California but will surely leave some British audiences wondering if it was made with them in mind at all. I suspect not.
Overboard is a remake of the 1987 film that starred Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell. It’s generally considered to be amusing, well-worked, classy fun. This 2018 remake? Not so much
Hawn played the yacht-owner first time round, but here it’s Mexican Eugenio Derbez, who takes on the role, as Leonardo, of an obnoxious playboy living off the wealth of his construction magnate father.
His is a world of champagne, hot tubs and obliging models, and he’s used to getting his own way.
So when Kate (Anna Faris), a hard-working widowed mother of three girls, not only expects to be paid for her carpet-cleaning services but has the feistiness to answer back… he throws her into the sea along with her expensive equipment.
For its new outing, it has been given a 21st-century makeover. The gender roles have been reversed with Eugenio Derbez (above with Anna Faris) playing the role of yacht-owner Leo
Poor Kate, already working three jobs, studying to become a nurse and facing eviction, is now thousands of dollars in debt too.
Until a drunken Leonardo falls overboard, wakes up with amnesia etc, and guess who sees an opportunity for revenge?
Actually, it’s not Kate but her best friend, Theresa (a rather wasted Eva Longoria), but you get the general life-swapping idea.
After an amnesia-causing accident, Leo finds he’s a poor construction worker and father-of-three (Hannah Nordberg, Payton Lepinski and Alyvia Alyn Lind, above with Derbez and Faris)
Suddenly, Leo discovers he’s an impoverished construction worker and father-of-three who’s infertile (Kate has to explain why her blonde daughters don’t look like their ‘father’) and, oh, a recovering alcoholic too.
Directed by Rob Greenberg, an experienced TV hand but here making his feature debut, the remake gets off to an awkward start, partly because large chunks play out in subtitled Spanish, and partly because Hawn lookalike Faris isn’t really leading lady material, but largely because the little-known Derbez is such strange casting for the role of Leonardo.
I mean, he’s 55, for goodness’ sake, and looks it… which is a bit old to be playing a playboy, especially in a romantic comedy. Russell, for the record, was 36 when the original was released. Faris is a relatively youthful-looking 41.
Eva Longoria (above with Faris) is rather wasted and modern communication – ie, the internet – damages the credibility of the plot, while modern morality limits our ability to accept it
Every now and then the film threatens to haul itself back to three-star respectability.
The original is nicely acknowledged – ‘we haven’t had a case of amnesia since a pretty young woman back in the Eighties’, the local police chief pronounces – Derbez improves with screen time and Faris does raise a chuckle or two.
The contrast between the Mexican haves (Leonardo’s wealthy family) and the Mexican have-nots (his fellow construction workers) is reasonably nicely established too.
But it’s never enough, as we head far too slowly towards redemption, with modern communication – ie, the internet – damaging the credibility of the plot, and modern morality, at times, limiting our ability to accept it.
Would a protective mother really leave her daughters with a man she barely knows… even if she is starting to like him?
A pivotal packet of condoms does slightly spoil what might have been the family fun.
There’s also something faintly depressing about a film – even a romantic comedy – that pays generous lip service to the idea that there is dignity in hard work and poverty before coming to the enthusiastic conclusion that it’s much better being rich.
Truly a tale for our times…
SECOND SCREEN
Freak Show (12A)
Rating: 
In The Fade (18)
Rating:
The over-arching themes of Trudie Styler’s debut feature, Freak Show, are tolerance, inclusion and acceptance, and they’re pretty much impossible to argue with.
The manner in which these themes are explored, however, is more debatable, with a distinct air of artifice, at times giving way to something approaching smugness and complacency, hanging in the air.
The British actor Alex Lawther – best known for playing the young Alan Turing in The Imitation Game – is Billy Bloom, a distinctly unorthodox American teenager whose love of cross-dressing and outrageous make-up earns him few friends when he is forced to live with his remote father and start a new high school as the mother he adores (Bette Midler) goes into rehab.
Alex Lawther (above) plays Billy Bloom, a distinctly unorthodox American teenager on a quest to become Homecoming Queen in Trudie Styler’s debut feature, Freak Show
There are definite echoes of Quentin Crisp to what ensues, with Billy refusing to compromise and paying the inevitably violent price.
But his defiance and self-confidence do earn him admirers, so when he decides to run for homecoming queen (he’s pro-glamour, pageantry and good hair), the outcome is far from clear.
In The Fade is a harrowing German drama with Diane Kruger as a young woman whose immigrant husband and young son are blown up by a terrorist bomb.
Directed by the Turkish film-maker Fatih Akin, it’s a tough old watch, partly because of the subject matter, of course, but partly because the second act becomes badly bogged down in the German legal system, while the third is, well… just a bit odd.
But Kruger, returning to her native Germany presumably to show she’s more than just a pretty Hollywood face, is quite magnificent, and deservedly won the Best Actress prize at last year’s Cannes Film Festival. Worth seeing for her alone.