Starter for 10
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Why do adults believe that young people who are excellent students are smart enough to figure out everything else about life? Instead, whey don’t adults worry that eggheads have spent so much time with their noses in books that they will be like fish out of water in other situations? In Starter for 10, Brian Jackson (James McAvoy) believes that knowledge is power, gets into university, and learns that it’s not. An encyclopaedic knowledge actually seems inversely correlated with wisdom. On the romantic front, things go exactly as you’d expect: He falls for the blonde bomb shell, gets crushed, and finds love with the more homely and substantial activist girl. The originality comes when Brian gets on the Bristol University team competing in “University Challenge” (similar to “Reach for the Top”). How Brian screws up speaks volumes about his lack of wisdom—even lack of basic common sense.
It is a toss up whether you’ll find the film clichéd or winning. I found it both. It is winning largely because the acting is good. James McAvoy is continually believable as the jejune scholar. Rebecca Hall is solid as the radical student handing out leaflets. She was exceptional in The Prestige (2006) and yet got barely a mention on this side of the Atlantic, so I’m pleased to see that both the film fans (Empire Awards) and the critics (London Critics Circle) in the U. K. have nominated her for her role in The Prestige. In Starter for 10, she and McAvoy are individually good but develop no chemistry that pulls the audience in. Alice Eve is assured as the blonde bombshell, but, probably through not fault of her own, she looks too much the part. She looks like a Hollywood starlet instead of an English university student, and, sure enough, she grew up in Los Angeles as well as in England. I found the film winning largely because I identified with Brian. The film tries to draw you in and deliver an emotional punch with carefully selected music. If you are moved by the Psychedelic Furs, the Buzzcocks, The Cure, and The Smiths, you’ll love the sound track. I found it mildly annoying. I wished that the film makers had, instead, put more effort into making the story more nitty-gritty and original.