IF review: A rich cast of A-list stars makes for a poor man’s version of Monsters Inc

IF

(U) 104mins

★★☆☆☆

IMAGINE a film that is jam-packed with A-listers, written by an award-winning dir­ec­tor and featuring enough cute little creatures to melt the hardest heart.

That would make for a guaranteed monster hit, right?

Alas, no.

This tale of Imaginary Friends (IF) is so muddled and misguided, you have to be very creative indeed to make sense of it.

It starts with the words from young Bea (Cailey Fleming): “The most important stories we tell are the ones we tell to ourselves.”

We see, through the lens of the family camcorder, a creative little girl with parents who adore her.

But her world changes quickly when her mum dies of cancer.

We then meet Bea again as a 12-year-old staying with her grandma (Fiona Shaw) while her dad (director and writer, John Krasinski) is in hospital awaiting a heart operation.

During her stay in the New York apartment, Bea discovers a room where Cal (an utterly miscast Ryan Reynolds) lives with IFs Blue (voiced by Steve Carell) and Blossom (Phoebe Waller-Bridge).

Cal confides in Bea that he helps the IFs who don’t have children any more.

They have grown up and can’t see their made-up mates any longer.

To help the creatures, he takes Bea to the retirement home full of IFs and we are subjected to an overlong and strangely dull sequence where the CGI creations audition for roles to find new owners.

By this point, you still have no idea who Cal is, why Bea’s dad is lying in a hospital bed for weeks BEFORE his operation, and also how her grandma doesn’t notice a 12-year-old in her care has disappeared with a middle-aged man for days on end.

Krasinski has certainly called in plenty of his mates to voice the IFs, including wife Emily Blunt as well as Matt Damon, Blake Lively, Bradley Cooper, George Clooney and Vince Vaughn.

Yet, they’re all pretty charmless.

There’s lots of racing around the streets of New York for the motley crew — to who or what, we’re never really quite told.

And littered with lame gags, the film seems to find itself far funnier than it is.

It has all the ingredients to make a tear-jerker of a blockbuster, but unfortunately, and oddly, this poor man’s version of Monsters Inc lacks imagination.

TWO TICKETS TO GREECE

 (15) 111 mins

★★★☆☆

TO us Brits, Dame Kristin Scott Thomas is the posh, frosty one from Four Weddings And A Funeral and The English Patient.

But in France, the actress, who lived in Paris for decades, is a very different type of national treasure.

She fires up her latest risqué French flick with a barnstorming turn as a dope-smoking, hippie swinger.

But before she pops up an hour in, we have to make do with a pleasant but familiar buddy comedy.

Uptight Blandine (Olivia Côte) has barely cracked a smile since her husband left her two years earlier.

In desperation, her teen son Benjamin (Alexandre Desrousseaux), tricks her into going on a Grecian trip with Magalie (Laure Calamy), the fun, loud school pal she hasn’t seen in years.

Writer-director Marc Fitoussi serves up mild hijinx as the bickering pair try to island hop to Amorgos.

It ticks over nicely but only really comes alive after a ferry mix-up sees them wind up at a plush Mykonos villa where Scott Thomas’s free spirit lives with her very patient Greek artist boyfriend (Panos Koronis).

Blandine, and Fitoussi, get their grooves back as the film blends raucous laughs with touching human drama.

HOARD

(18) 126mins

★★★★☆

MARIA, a young girl living in filth and squalor alongside her hoarder mother, is put into foster care.

Years later, the arrival of handsome loner Michael – played by Stranger Things star Joseph Quinn – at her foster home triggers her need for compulsive hoarding and dangerous sexual behaviour with the young man.

Director Luna Carmoon draws from her own experiences of growing up in 1980s London, to tell this captivating account about overcoming loss and childhood trauma.

The film stars newcomer Saura Lightfoot-Leon who, as the now grown-up Maria, delivers one of the most memorable performances of the year yet.

There is perhaps too much grime here for everyone – you will feel like taking a very long and very hot bath after it – but Hoard also feels like the purest and most honest representation of trauma-led adult ­dysfunction.

The film is often elevated by some impressive performances from its two leads. Elsewhere, Maria’s troubled mother Cynthia is played with brilliance by the always excellent Hayley Squires.

Not for the faint-hearted, but strangely moving.

By Linda Marric