Starter for Ten

Starter for Ten is a 2006 film, based on a novel by David Nicholls (who's best-selling novel One Day is currently being filmed), starring a young James McAvoy.

The film follows the story of Brian (James McAvoy), the son of a widowed single mum (Catherine Tate) who is driven to escape his sleepy seaside town and head to university in Bristol to study English in 1985 by wanting to 'know everything', something that he began to be connected to through watching University Challenge. When he arrives he meets the Rebecca Epstein (Rebecca Hall), a Jewish activist against the changes in Thatcher's Britain and Alice Harbinson (Alice Eve), a very posh and very attractive young woman. He also finally manages to muscle his way on to the university's University Challenge team, much to the chagrin of the captain Patrick (Benedict Cumberbatch).

I quite enjoyed it. There are flares of comedy, as can be expected from Nicholls, whose novels are among my favourites, as well as a touching examination of family, friendships and relationships. Brian is driven by the memory of his father to succeed, and his interactions with his friends from home Spencer (Dominic Cooper) and Tone (James Cordon) show the way he is moving away, and yet is attached to his friends. Spencer and Tone are also representative of the growing unemployment rate of the 1980s, a situation which is being mirrored here. Brian is also 'a typical guy' in his attraction to the pretty but vacant Alice, over the lovely Rebecca, and it takes the majority of the film for him to realise that Rebecca was his soulmate.

McAvoy's performance is very good as a lightly comic but driven young student, and it was interesting to me to see him do a proper comedy, considering the only films I've seen him in tend to be more dramatic, such as Atonement. Again, I really enjoyed Rebecca Hall's understated performance, and Dominic Cooper is brilliant in the supporting role of Spencer, a guy who we get the hint of being quite smart but who lacks the motivation (or support) to do anything with his life. I also enjoyed Benedict Cumberbatch playing the obsessive, smarmy Patrick, and Mark Gatiss' cameo performance as the legendary University Challenge host Bamber Gascoigne.

All in all, whilst it is quite a small film with a gentle comedy edge, I thoroughly enjoyed it.