Parky at the Pictures (In Cinemas 6/12/12)

Indeed, Hollywood has done slightly better in the wine movie stakes. In 1940, Garson Kanin staged They Knew What They Wanted in a Napa Valley vineyard, owner Charles Laughton uses a photo of handsome hand William Gargan in his postal courtship of waitress Carole Lombard, while Henry King teamed Rock Hudson and Jean Simmons in an adaptation of Alice Tisdale Hobart's novel about a California vineyard in the Prohibition era, This Earth Is Mine (1959). More recently, Alexander Payne accompanied Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church on a midlife jaunt through Santa Barbara in Sideways (2004) and Randall Miller's Bottle Shock (2008) recalled the so-called `Judgement of Paris' that saw California wines defeat the best of France in a 1976 blind tasting competition.

Given the number of film folk with connections to the wine trade, including Francis Ford Coppola, Gérard Depardieu, John Lasseter, Carole Bouquet, Antonio Banderas and Dan Aykroyd, one might have expected a few more pictures on the subject. Perhaps they might take inspiration from Gilles Legrand's Tu Seras Mon Fils/You Will Be My Son, which combines the simmering incident of a dynastic soap opera with the authentic detail of one of Laurent Cantet's workplace dramas. Co-scripted by Legrand, Sandrine Cayron and Delphine de Vigan and evocatively photographed by Yves Angelo to contrast the sunlit expanses and dingy cellars, this feels as though it could have been made in the 1960s, with Jean Gabin as the flint-hearted patriarch, Maurice Ronet as the hapless son, Michel Simon as the once loyal lieutenant and Alain Delon as the returning prodigal. That said, this ensemble excels from the opening sequence, as Lorànt Deutsch leaves a funeral parlour with no great sense of desolation at the loss of his father. Instead, he has a look of determination that is explained in the remaining action, which is, essentially, an extended flashback 

Finishing an interview with journalist Hélène de Saint-Père, vintner Niels Arestrup returns to the house dominating the sprawling Saint-Emilion estate that has been his life since he inherited it from his father in 1963. Despite being widowed for many years, he occupies the main part of the building, while son Lorànt Deutsch lives in a side wing with wife Anne Marivin. They have long been hoping for a child, but their ill luck seems to confirm Arestrup's verdict that Deutsch is a trier who lacks the spark, let alone the nose and expertise, to be his successor.

Moreover, when he learns from doctor Jean-Marc Roulot that trusted right-hand man Patrick Chesnais is suffering from inoperable pancreatic cancer, Arestrup realises that he will be hard-pressed to find a suitable replacement. So, he summons Chesnais's son Nicolas Bridet from his high-flying job with the Coppola vineyard in California and delights in allying with him in mocking Deutsch's inability to judge the bouquet of the bottles that Arestrup brings to  supper.

Arestrup is also aware, however, that Deutsch still has a part to play if the business is to retain its reputation and tries to convince him that a steady administrator is just as important as a gifted wine-maker. He illustrates his point about doing what is best for the brand by recalling how he convinced everyone his father had drowned in the nearby river rather than in a butt of his own wine. But, while he continues to put a pinch of his ashes into each new vintage, Arestrup insists it is hard work and determination not heredity that goes into producing a quality wine. However, the conservative Chesnais disagrees and, in the humble cottage where he lives with wife Valérie Mairesse, he warns Bridet about getting ideas above his station and reminds him that, no matter how big a part he plays in maintaining standards, it will never be his family name on the label.

As Deutsch and Bridet had been friends since childhood, the latter is keen not to step on his toes and suggests they celebrate the gathering of the harvest by going clubbing. However, Deutsch gets jealous when Bridet flirts with waitress Shirley Bousquet and, when Arestrup hears about their quarrel, he accuses Deutsch of being a snob who puts personal ambition above the good of the firm. In order to teach him a lesson, he invites Bridet to be his guest when he travels to Paris to collect the Legion of Honour. They stay in the Grand Hotel and Arestrup treats Bridet to a pair of expensive handmade shoes before offering him Chesnais's job and a full partnership in the company

Furious at seeing Bridet being labelled Arestrup's son in a newspaper report, Chesnais lectures him on tradition and flatly dismisses his old friend's request to let him adopt Bridet so the estate can pass into safe hands. Undaunted, Arestrup attempts to bribe Marivin into relocating far away and, when this gambit fails, he takes Deutsch to his mother's graveside and informs him that he will not allow him to destroy the business in the same way that his fecklessness killed her.

Distraught at his ostracisation, Deutsch gets drunk and is hospitalised following a car crash. While Marivin visits with the news she is finally pregnant, Arestrup seeks to reassure the suddenly scruple-stricken Bridet by telling him that he was also adopted and that the land has now chosen him to be his heir. But the dying Chesnais is determined to prevent the natural order from being disrupted and he locks Arestrup in the cellar with the ventilation off so that the fermentation fumes can do their worst.

On returning from the crematorium, Deutsch scatters Arestrup's ashes and treads them into the soil. In so doing, he seems to curse his own tenure, as he clearly knows nothing about his grandfather being a secret ingredient in Arestrup's recipe. However, the ending is somewhat ambiguous, as there is still a possibility that Deutsch will make a success of the venture and pass it on to his own son. One wonders how an American film-maker will conclude the seemingly inevitable remake.

Although this may not be the most artistically ambitious picture, Gilles Legrand wisely allows the focus to fall on the family feud and, thus, ensures this makes for satisfyingly potent viewing. Arestrup delivers another imperious performance as the ruthless pragmatist prepared to exploit legal loopholes to secure his succession, while Chesnais captures the proud integrity of the faithful retainer stung into opposing his master. Bridet also convinces as the prodigal needing to be reminded of his place. But it's Deutsch who most impresses, as he battles the doubts arising from his personal and professional shortcomings and, in the process, merely confirms his father's suspicions.

The script is a tad over-deliberate in places and Legrand might have added more detail about the wine-making process and explored how the trade is holding up in the recession. But, as his primary inspiration came from the relationship between Hal Holbrook and Emile Hirsch in Sean Penn's Into the Wild (2007), this is evidently intended to be a father-son rather than a workplace study. Moreover, Legrand's sense of place is exemplary. Thus, even though the denouement descends into whodunit-style melodrama, this is a solid piece of film-making in the best `tradition of quality' manner.

The emphasis shifts on to mother and son with I, Anna, as the debuting Barnaby Southcombe directs mother Charlotte Rampling in a flimsy film noir adapted from a New York novel by Elsa Lewin. Scripted in the most self-consciously elliptical manner in a bid to disguise the non-mystery's readily apparent deficiencies, the feature is further hampered by a jarring techno score by K.I.D., some extraneous songs by Richard Hawley and a final reel reveal that is designed to add psychological depth, but serves only to tip an already pretentious attempt to give a genre flick some arthouse significance into Sixth Sense territory.

First seen being fobbed off by a friend during a conversation in a pay phone, Charlotte Rampling works in the beds department of an Oxford Street store and shares her home with daughter Hayley Atwell and her young daughter. Recently divorced and struggling to cope with the rejection, Rampling attends speed dating events organised in posh hotel by Caroline Catz. Encouraged by Honor Blackman during a brief encounter at the make-up mirror in the ladies to put her best foot forward, Rampling accepts a drink from singleton Ralph Brown and surprises herself by going back to his apartment in the Barbican complex.

Next morning, she wakes to find a bloody body beside her and, in fleeing, leaves her umbrella in the lift. Shortly afterwards, neighbour Perry Benson notices water dripping through his ceiling and calls the police on discovering Brown lying on the living room floor. Insomniac DCI Gabriel Byrne picks up the call from headquarters and conducts preliminary inquiries, while being distracted by a testy phone conversation with his ex-wife. He is more alert on leaving the building, however, when he notices Rampling reclaiming her umbrella and notes down her registration number as she drives away.

Across the capital, Brown's son, Max Deacon, arrives home with a scratch on his face and mother Jodhi May suspects the worst when DI Eddie Marsan leaves his card under her door and asks him to call her when she has a minute. Along with underlings Bryan Dick and Nav Sidhu, Marsan quickly establishes that Deacon and his pal Jumayn Hunter owe money to drug dealer Joey Ansah and that they had planned to steal cash from Brown's safe. However, when Deacon walked in to find his father canoodling with Rampling, he told Hunter they would have to postpone the robbery and was badly beaten for his trouble.

But, such is the convolution of the scenario, that these bald facts are scrambled in the hope of generating a modicum of suspense in those who have not already realised the connection (concocted during the shoot after Rampling genuinely injured herself) between Brown being battered to death with a stone bust and Rampling having hurt her wrist so badly that she needs to have it encased in a plaster cast that causes an itch that doubles as her troubled conscience, as she seems to have suppressed all memory of her crime. Indeed, she cannot remember greeting Byrne when she retrieved her brolly and this convinces him, after they have flirted at another speed dating session, that she is either entirely innocent of Brown's murder or is hiding something.

Rampling has had cause once before to bury tragedy in her subconscious and Byrne prompts this to resurface when she catches him playing back her tell-tale answerphone messages. Indeed, ignoring Marsan's plea not to handle the case alone, Byrne comes perilously close to making matters much worse by taking Rampling back to Brown's flat to confront her demons. But, even though he succeeds in talking her down from an outside balcony ledge, there is no guarantee (in spite of the discovery that Brown had a history of violence) that a jury will accept her plea of self-defence or that she will find a happy ever after with her dishevelled detective.

Given the magnitude of some of the flaws in a film that is positively riddled with them, it has been more than a little annoying to see so many critics citing Rampling's failure to possess a mobile phone among the plot's primary implausibilities. It may come as a surprise to them to learn, but there are people out there who manage to function and even have reasonably fulfilling lives without owning a device that both places them permanently at the beck and call of anyone with itchy fingers and prevents them from having meaningful conversations with people actually in the same room as themselves. Surely the sloppy structuring, risible climactic twist and disappointing lack of chemistry between the leads are more valid reasons for frustration than a sixtysomething women opting not to own a mobile when she could easily afford one.

All carping aside, there are a few plus points here. Southcombe and cinematographer Ben Smithard make atmospheric use of their locale, with the Barbican being made to seem particularly soulless and sinister. The performance of Eddie Marsan is also typically strong, while Rampling manages to convey a hint of vulnerability beneath her customarily haughty exterior  But Gabriel Byrne seems stuck in Colombo mode and only suggests the lingering pain of his own divorce when alone in his hotel room. Thus, while it has a few pertinent things to say about isolation, regret and meeting somebody new in later life, this is a bit of a muddle that should stand its makers in better stead when they embark upon their next project.

Twelve years Southcombe's junior and unable to draw on the same reserves of theatrical experience, 28 year-old Alex Barrett can be more readily forgiven for the blemishes in his first feature, Life Just Is. Billed as an anti-drama with nods towards Carl Dreyer and Ingmar Bergman, this is a bold bid to produce an existential week-in-the-life saga centred around five recent university graduates struggling to make the transition from carefree student to responsible adult. Capably played by a cast whose occasionally hesitancies can again be excused, this also attempts to introduce an element of Ozu-like stillness into visuals that are refreshingly free from bravura shakicam shots and gratuitous rapid cuts.

The film opens in Saturday night darkness as the final lines of a cheesy romcom play on the soundtrack. Flatmates Jack Gordon, Will De Meo and Nathaniel Martello-White join forces to mock the triteness of what they have just seen, especially when Fiona Ryan attempts to defend it. But even Gordon and De Meo have their doubts about the kind of `boom-ra' action adventure that Martello-White prefers. Having established that the last member of their usual quintet, Jayne Wisener, is out with new boyfriend Paul Nicholls, Ryan heads home and walks in to the sound of them canoodling in Wisener's room.

Ryan teases her roommate when she catches her smooching in the kitchen on Sunday morning and tuts when she fails to elicit any juicy details about the night before. Later in the day, the trio drop in on the boys to find Gordon having a crisis about life, death and faith and Wisener is stung when Nicholls mentions an old flame in sympathising about his search for meaning in Kierkegaard. The mood lightens when De Meo plays `Geordie in Wonderland' on his guitar and his pals sing along with the chorus. However, Nicholls, who has been dozing on the sofa, is keen to leave and the others make their excuses to Ryan and Martello-White alone together. They banter for a bit before Ryan departs, leaving their `will they, won't they' relationship in its customary state of limbo.

Gordon knows better than to ask about the situation when he bumps into Martello-White in the kitchen on Monday morning. Besides, he would much rather discuss his own feelings of loneliness and is nettled when his friend suggests he finds something more useful to do with his day than read. As he marches off to work, Martello-White notices a limping, bearded man (Jason Croot-Walahfrid) in the street and thinks he looks suspicious. Indeed, he is so keen to discuss him with his friends when he gets home that fails to notice the subdued mood caused by the death of a mutual friend at just 25.

Wisener is so saddened by the news that she refuses to let Nicholls stay over. But it is Gordon who is most effected and he wakes with a jolt after trying unsuccessfully to pray. Next morning, he tells Martello-White that he had received a visitation from St Francis of Assisi and has realised that he is simply living in order to die. Never one to think too deeply, Martello-White insists he would feel better if he got some fresh air, but he only makes it as far as the bus stop before beating a retreat.

Over lunch, Nicholls invites Wisener for a weekend away. But she prevaricates because he has also arranged to have a drink with his ex and she is reluctant to get in too deep having only just recovered from her childhood sweetheart cheating on her. Ryan reassures her she has made the right decision that  evening when Wisener walks in on her arranging her surprise birthday party with Martello-White. After he leaves, Wisener joshes Ryan about her feelings for him and she says they have been friends too long to risk it all on a potentially ruinous romance.

As De Meo joins the girls to discuss his job in a charity shop and his latest boyfriend, Martello-White gets home to find Gordon poring over a website devoted to St Francis. He wonders whether God has a purpose for him, but Martello-White says he should invest in the here and now because there is no guarantee that a deity exists and he is more likely to do something foolish or commit suicide over religion than he is by living to the full. But, while Gordon is grateful for his buddy's advice, he is less amused when his boorish mates Joshua Osei and Niall Phillips show up at Wisener's party and they get into a row about drink and drugs.

Nicholls is also having an uncomfortable time, as he realises how little he knows about his lover when she tells parents-to-be Rachel Bright and Lachlan McCall that she isn't the mothering kind and then gets excited about the graphic novel her sister (Gillian Wisener) has bought for her. Drunk Andrew Hawley briefly keeps everyone amused by waffling on about teapots and déjà vu, but even Martello-White loses his sense of humour when he sees Ryan snogging with Osei and he storms off to bed.

His mood is scarcely improved on Thursday when he tries to follow Croot-Walahfrid and is spooked when he seems to vanish into thin air. On arriving home, he finds Ryan waiting to apologise for her tipsy indiscretion, but they end up having a blazing row because of his presumption that a vaguely foreign-looking man (when he is black himself) has to be a terrorist. Wisener offers a shoulder to cry on when Ryan gets home, but Martello-White has no time for self-pity because Gordon has remembered he starts work the following week and he will lose the freedom to do whatever he pleases and laments that he will never read all the books or see all the films he wants. Consequently, he is already in a right state when he is awoken again by a presence in his room.

As Friday comes, Gordon wakes late and shuffles out to the bus stop. However, he is soon scrambling home to consult a copy of Dostoevsky's The Devils and seems on the verge of a breakdown. However, he has calmed down by the time Martello-White gets home and he confides that he has realised he is not ready to make a leap into faith or non-faith and that his reason for living is to search for validation.

Finally feeling at peace with himself, he agrees to go to a firework party that evening, where they commiserate with Wisener for being dumped by Nicholls. Sensing a lull in the conversation, Gordon asks at what age it is appropriate to start thinking you've wasted your life and they all laugh at him. He shrugs and claims to be having a `pre-life crisis' and then joins the others as they sing along with De Meo and Ryan and Martello-White exchange little looks that signify everything is back to normal between them.

One suspects some are going to commend Barrett somewhat sarcastically for having followed to the letter Cesare Zavattini's definition of a neo-realist film as being `90 minutes in the life of a man to whom nothing happens'. But, while this may not be as hectic as an episode of This Life or Fresh Meat, there is still plenty going on in this assured study of twentysomething insecurity. The romantic problems are unremarkable, but Gordon's quest for a spiritual and intellectual purpose is highly unusual and Barrett deserves great credit for tackling such weighty issues. It's just a shame that he errs more on the side of Joanna Hogg than Eric Rohmer, as the performances are sometimes stiff and the non-speaking characters often look as if their listening for cues rather than participating in a discussion.

But the visual style is most assured, with Barrett keeping Yosuke Kato's camera at a discreet distance and composing the frame in such a way to enable long takes rather than employing the standard shot-reverse-shot editing technique. Moreover, he also lingers on empty space in the classic Ozu manner and if they can't quite be considered `pillow shots', they might just qualify for the epithet `scatter cushion shots'.

Another home-grown ensemble piece comes to the Phoenix this week. Made back in 2007 and the recipient of awards at several international festivals, John McKenzie's 12 in a Box is a burlesqued variation on the old dark house format that has much in common with the director's 1996 debut, Vol-au-vent, in which a trio of jewel thieves compound the series of disasters threatening to ruin a haute bourgeois wedding. The calamities again come thick and fast during a school reunion involving some of Britain's brightest comic talents. But, even though the Palladian elegance of Kirtlington Park provides a magnificent setting, this frantic romp never quite hits its straps.

Things get off to a stodgy start, as the former pupils of St Michael's School arrive in dribs and drabs for a get together that has been arranged through the alumni website. First on the scene is Anjella Mackintosh and her boorish financier husband Brian Mitchell, who isn't an Old Michaelian and is frustrated at being dragged into the countryside while he is trying to negotiate the deal that could save his flagging business. As they bicker in the entrance hall, lonelyheart Katy Wix shows up, with elderly couple Paul Williamson and Clare Welch hot on her heels. They were contemporaries of their host, Robert Cargill, who doesn't appear to be at home, and they suggest repairing to the drawing room to await developments.

Perky Lucy Chalkley enters soon afterwards, along with the twitchy Kenneth Collard, the strapping Gareth Clarke, church mouse Belle Mary Hithersay, stuttering Glynne Steele and his prim wife Jane Mcdowell, and ditzy Phoebe Sweeney, who quickly realises that she attended a completely different St Michael's to everybody else. As they mutter about the rumness of the situation, wizened butler Geoffrey Wildey shuffles into the room and invites the assembled to watch a videotape, in which Cargill explains that he is about to die without issue and has decided to share his fortune with strangers chosen at random from the website because his schooldays were the happiest of his life.

However, in order to earn cheques for £1 million each, the lucky dozen have to remain en masse on the premises for 96 hours without contacting the outside world after a restricted phone call to reassure loved ones. Collard has to be talked into staying, as he is due to get married in a couple of days, and the broody Mcdowell and pious Hithersay also take some persuading. But, eventually, they all vote to co-operate and set off to explore the house.

Unfortunately, Williamson succumbs to a heart attack on the cellar steps and Welch agrees to deposit his body in the chest freezer so as not to let the side down. However, Collard's fiancée, Miranda Hart, proves less accommodating when she barges her way into the mansion and has to be locked in a bedroom to prevent her from breaching the terms of the wager. But a jilted bride-to-be soon turns out to be the least of the cabal's problems, as Wix vows to vamp Clarke and keep him away from Chalkley and Sweeney, Mackintosh informs Mitchell that she has no intention of sharing her windfall with him and the deeply religious Hithersay winds up in bed with Steele after curing his stammer. And, oh yes, with around 36 hours to go, burglars Ian Groombridge and Robert Hines break in and have to be tied to chairs to prevent them from mingling with the other guests.

As tempers fray and trust breaks down irreparably, guards are posted to prevent the distraught Mcdowell from escaping. But a slip on the stairs leaves the survivors with another corpse to hide as coppers David Burrows-Sutcliffe and Ed Bennett arrive with a warning about a local crime wave.

In keeping with all good farces, McKenzie saves the best for the denouement, with sequences at the lodge gate and in the near-empty drawing room respectively providing some slick knockabout and a satisfyingly sardonic twist. Yet, no matter how hard the willing cast works, this struggles to gain much comic momentum or dramatic suspense. The physically mismatched Hart and Collard have their moments, while Hithersay amuses with the whispered entreaties that signify another imminent fall from grace. But the dialogue lacks consistent wit and the slender characterisation makes it difficult to root for any of the largely resistible protagonists, especially as McKenzie relies so heavily on impersonal sitcom-style medium shots.

Rather like another comedy set in an Oxfordshire stately home, Guy Browning's Tortoise in Love, this is clearly a labour of love and it is fascinating to see such familiar small-screen faces as Miranda Hart and Kenneth Collard at an earlier stage in their careers. So let's hope that cinemagoers from across the county can make allowances and support a local picture that is always enjoyable, if not exactly memorable.

This summation is equally applicable to Oliver Dieckmann's When Santa Fell to Earth, which has been adapted from a novel by Cornelia Funke, who was responsible for the much-loved Inkheart series. Challenging kids to consider the commercialisation of Christmas, this is entertainment with a message. But, unlike Hollywood movies on the same subject, this is refreshingly free of crass humour and gushing sentimentality, although the CGI effects are markedly less sophisticated.

Even though the festive seasons is approaching, nine year-old Noah Kraus is down in the dumps. Struggling to get used to a new town after father Fritz Karl lost his job at the bank and mother Jessica Schwarz suggested relocating so she could open a sweet shop, he finds school excruciating because he is constantly being picked on by class bully Paul Alhäuser. He would like to befriend Mercedes Jadea Diaz, who lives across the road with her mother Gruschenka Stevens, as he would like to play with her dog Mutt. But the pair are thrown together when Alexander Scheer comes plunging out of the sky in his caravan.

Having spotted the crash in the middle of a thunderstorm, Kraus heads into the countryside to see if he can find any wreckage. Alhäuser is already there with his pals, but they run away when Kraus boldly knocks on the door and is invited inside by Scheer, who introduces him to angels Christine Urspruch and Charly Hübner and his elf helpers Flybeard and Spillbeard (who are animated, whereas the angels are miniaturised actors). He also explains that he is the last surviving Santa Claus and only just managed to escape from the Christmas Palace before greedy business executive Volker Lechtenbrink turned him to chocolate, like his fellow Santas, in a cynical bid to outlaw every Yuletide tradition and replace them with a celebration based on the giving and receiving of the most expensive possible presents.

Initially sceptical, Kraus is unnerved by the description of the giant Nutcracker soldier who tried to capture Scheer and offers to help him find missing reindeer Twinklestar, who was so frightened by the storm that it turned invisible. He is joined in his quest after Diaz also stumbles upon the caravan (which seems to invite the curiosity of no grown-ups) and follow Mutt's nose as he leads them to the mall, where they earn the reindeer's trust with some special food and surprise the shoppers by pulling down a giant Christmas tree and appearing to fly away on thin air.

Scheer is delighted to be reunited with Twinklestar and goes out that night gathering children's wishes as they sleep. However, he spots some of Lechtenbrink's grey-hatted agents prowling around the town and heads back to his caravan after sprinkling Schwarz's shop with some magic dust. Desperate to get home, Scheer shows Kraus and Diaz the red workshop tucked away in a corner of his caravan and asks them if they are willing to undertake a dangerous mission high in the frozen mountains so he can defeat Lechtenbrink. However, things don't go according to plan and the children only just manage to get back into the caravan as they are chased by the grey man and it's not long before the wicked Lechtenbrink himself arrives in the town disguised as Santa and chatting to the people milling around Schwarz's thriving store.

Kraus and Diaz try to warn Scheer, but succeed only in leading Lechtenbrink to the caravan and he forces his way inside and orders Scheer to open the door leading back to his realm. But the three friends aren't prepared to give in without a fight and they not only knockout some Nutcrackers with well-aimed snowballs, but also steal Lechtenbrink's boots. However, even though they manage to freeze their foe to the spot, there is no guarantee everyone is going to have a happy Christmas. Or is there?

Although a touch slow in places, this makes for genial festive fare. Kraus and Diaz prove willing and resourceful, while Scheer quickly convinces that Santa doesn't have to be an old man with a white beard. More might have been made of the menacing Lechtenbrink and his army of Nutcrackers and grey men, although budgetary limitations clearly prevented Dieckmann from depicting Scheer's magical mountain home. But the lessons about the real meaning of Christmas are nicely presented and should touch young and old alike.