ANGUS, THONGS AND PERFECT SNOGGING - a qualified thumbs up from the target demographic

A sure sign of ageing: I offered The Kid a chance to see the WALL-E preview; she asked to see ANGUS, THONGS AND PERFECT SNOGGING instead. Since when did The Kid know about thongs? And have I taught her nothing about cinema? Ah well, youth must be indulged even if the mere title of the movie brought me out in hives.

ANGUS, SNOGS AND PERFECT SNOGGING is based on a series of exceptionally successful children's books by Louise Rennison. The books are narrated by a teenager called Georgia Nicolson who is willing to do anything to get a boyfriend. The film is a catalogue of her attempts - from changing her physical appearance to taking snogging lessons to using an innocent bystander to make her putative boyfriend jealous. The whole thing is pretty formulaic, including the fact that Georgia manages to piss off all her friends in the third act before a completely unearned happy ending in the fourth. (The evil baddie got pretty harsh treatment - I thought unnecessarily harsh.)

The message of the film is apparently that young girls should be happy looking the way they look, because Mr Right will like you just the way you are. Laudable enough. But why did I have to sit through ninety minutes of dialogue so puerile I got seriously worried about The Kid's sanity? To give you a flavour, here's the description of the one of the books from the website: "The third gorgey book about Georgia's adventures - guaranteed to have you laughing your knickers off. Find out how Georgia copes with her rapidly expanding nunga-nungas!" I mean, dear gods, did Ms Pankurst chain herself to the railings for this?! Clearly, I am not the demographic for this movie, and I strongly suggest that you drop your over 12s at the cinema and pick them up afterwards.

The only opinion that matters, I suppose, is that of The Kid. She had a great time, once she got over the shock of the changed title, lack of berets(?) and collapsed storyline. Apparently, the screenwriters have combined events from different novels, presumably saving us from sequels, and massively beefed up the parents marriage trouble storyline. She thought Robbie was cute (Aaron Johnson - the kid from THE ILLUSIONIST and THE THIEF LORD) and that Georgia was perfect. I also thought that Georgia Groome gave a charming performance. Moreover, she was playing a role a million miles away from her turn in LONDON TO BRIGHTON. She's evidently an actress to watch. Finally, though, even The Kid thought the denouement was just too ridiculously fairy-tale. And she has a pretty high hurdle-rate for schmaltz. So, all in all, I guess it's a qaulified thumbs up from the fan-base.

ANGUS, THONGS AND PERFECT SNOGGING goes on release in the UK on July 25th. It opens in Italy on August 1st; in Belgium on August 13th; in Germany on August 28th; in Australia and Russia on September 18th; in Norway on September 26th; in the Netherlands on October 2nd; in Spain on October 2nd; in Sweden on October 17th and in Denmark on January 2nd 2009.

Overlooked DVD of the month - PARIS JE T'AIME

PARIS JE T'AIME is a series of 18 five minute short films inspired by the different arrondisements of Paris. Each director had 2 days to film in their designated area. Sadly, the films don't really work as a coherent whole. It isn't the case that watching one film will give you a cunning insight to another. As such, I'll review them as individual shorts.

The movie opens with MONTMARTRE**, in which director-actor Bruno Podalydès skewers our post-card vision of Paris, and Montmartre in particular, as a city of love. A middle-aged man curses the traffic and his lack of success with women. It's an entirely forgettable segment.

Gurinder Chadha uses her segment, QUAIS DE SEINE*, to comment on European perceptons of Muslim women who wear the hijab. A young girl articulates her choice to wear the veil to a bemused young ethnic European boy. This segment isn't forgettable but for all the wrong reasons. It's a pretty trite exploration of an extremely complicated social issue. Maybe a more profound treatment isn't possible in a five-minute slot? But if that were the case, Chadha should have chosen another story.

In LE MARAIS****, we finally get a fascinating and memorable segment. Gus van Sant shows a young man (Gaspard Ulliel) telling another that he loves him, not realising that the object of his affections can't understand French well enough to understand him. It's an enchanting and tragic little mood piece, but I don't quite understand why we need to have a cameo of Marianne Faithful. It strikes me as redundant cinematic name-dropping.

TUILLERIES**** is another fantastic segment. The Coen Brothers mess with us by filming the entire skit in a metro station. A nervous American tourist (Buscemi) gets roundly beaten up for daring to make eye contact with a kissing couple. So much for the city of love!

Walter Salles sticks to his preoccupations with social divides in LOIN DU 16e**. Cataline Sandino Moreno leaves her own baby to work as a nanny after a perishing commute. Her employer dehumanises her. It's all worthy enough but just like's Chadha's segment, comes across as a bit obvious and trite.

Christopher Doyle's bizarre segment has a salesman (Barbet Schroeder) enter a surreal Chinatown salon in PORTE DE CHOISY*. I was bemused and unimpressed. It's a shame - because it somewhat detracts from Doyle's reputation as an outstanding cinematographer.

In BASTILLE**, Leonor Watling shows a wealthy man trapped in a loveless marriage, but rediscovering his love for his wife (Miranda Richardson) when she falls ill. Much like the first segment, I thought Watling gave us a rather dull story, told with no visual flair.

Nobuhiro Suwa gives us a segment that rather predictably uses Juliette Binoche as a grieving mother. In a Gondry-esque flight of fancy she deludes herself with visions of a cowboy (Willem Defoe) in PLACE DES VICTOIRES**. It's all a bit mawkish and forced.

Sylvain Chaumet shows life in Paris for two mimes in TOUR EIFFEL****. It's sweet and bizarre and rather strange.

Alfonso Cuarón puts together a tricksy single take conversation between Nick Nolte and Ludivigne Sagnier in PARC MONCEAU***. It's clever but hardly substantial or affecting.

Oliver Assayas has Maggie Gyllenhaal procure drugs in the QUARTIER DES ENFANTS ROUGES***. He makes a nice comment about the interaction between the heritage of the district and the current underground scene.

Oliver Schmitz shows a moment of violence and rekindled love at first sight in PLACE DES FETES*****. It's arguably the best segment in the movie. The acting is brilliant - the concept is original - it's tricksy but emotionally engaging all at the same time. Although it's five minutes long you feel you really know the characters and the lives they live. And best of all, you get the kind of social insight that Chadha and Salles were striving for without feeling lectured at.

Richard LaGravenese has Bob Hoskins and Fanny Ardant act out an argument for a prostitute in PIGALLE***. It's fun but not much more.

The same could be said of Vincenzo Natali's fantasy in LA MADELAINE***. Elijah Wood's hapless traveller chances upon Olga Kurylenko's sexy vampire.

Wes Craven's PERE-LACHAISE***, where Oscar Wilde helps Rufus Sewell win back Emily Mortimer, is also well-acted but insubstantial.

Like a middle-class version of PLACE DES FETES, Tom Tykwer condenses an entire relationship between a blind man and Natalie Portman's acting student into five minutes in FAUBOURG-ST DENIS****. The two leads act beautifully - the story has a great twist - and the use of music and the musicality of speech is outstanding.

In QUARTIER LATIN**, Ben Gazzara and Gena Rowlands have a last drink before separating in a bar run by Gérard Depardieu. Frédéric Auburtin directs. Yawn.

Perhaps most controversial and open to interpretation is Alexander Payne's segment 14e ARRONDISEMENT*/*****. He has a stereotypical American tourist (Margo Martindale) recite in demotic French her love for Paris. I can't make up my mind whether he's being very patronising about American tourists, or whether he's actually satirising European prejudices about Americans. This segment is either offensive or brilliant! You decide!

MISTRESS OF SPICES - one for the feng shui idiots

MISTRESS OF SPICES is a truly execrable movie - one of those films that transends mediocrity and becomes physically painful to watch. The guilty party is writer and first-time director Paul Mayeda Berges - husband of cross-over queen Gurinder Chadha, which perhaps explains how he got this pile of sentimental goo financed. The movie stars Aishwarya Rai. Now here's the thing. Aish is beautiful and a talented classical Indian dancer. I even believe she is a good actress when well-directed in Indian art cinema - take RAINCOAT or CHOKHER BALI as evidence for the defence. But Aish is consistently shocking in English-language cinema, perhaps because up until this point we have only seen her in ill-written movies by Chadha (BRIDE & PREJUDICE) and now Berges.

Perhaps the problem is that Berges is trying to create something that is mystical and magical but which simply seems absurd. The idea is that Aishwarya Rai's character is one of many young women around the world who can basically do magic by giving people the right spices. So, if you want to make knew friends, Aish will pop a cinammon stick into your turban and, before you know it, you'll be the Homecoming Queen. Or rather, because MISTRESS OF SPICES has a Serious Message about Race Relations - a member of the Crips. Of course, with infinite power comes the itty-bitty-living-space* and celibacy. And you know what that means - Aish is going to meet a gorgeous hunk and fall in love with him in the first five minutes of the movie and then spend eighty-five minutes wondering whether or not the universe will explode if she has sex with him. Added to this, Berges has written a screenplay that turns its back on conventional dialogue and puts a bunch of ridiculous internal monologue in its place. What this means is you get a lot of stuff like: "Talk to me, chillies!" or "Chillies, don't send him away, he means me no harm." Puh-lease.

MISTRESS OF SPICES showed at Toronto 2005 and is released in the UK on April 21st. It opens in India on April 28th 2006 and in the US on May 5th. *Upon perusing the Disney website for the Aladdin link I was disturbed to find that the 2-disc edition features "A Whole New World" sung by Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey. And this was used as a marketing plus-point.