Like Minds contains much to recommend it and much to annoy. Overall, it's well acted, atmospheric, intriguing and interesting and if you love Eddie Redmayne, here's a real treat to see him playing against type.
It's a British(specifically Yorkshire)/Australian co-pro with an apparent requirement to be shot in both locations. It's clearly set geographically in the North of England but the entire cast speak as if from the South. OK, it's set in an English public (i.e. private) school and everyone is posh - but the police also are not depicted as local and there's never a reference to where the school is supposed to be. Most jarring is that the scenes set on trains and on railway lines must have been shot in Australia because British trains look completely different and the carriage interiors just can't be in England. In a film that requires suspension of disbelief lack of authenticity in locations undermines the movie.
Toni Collette nearly passes herself off as English but her accent slips from time to time. There's no reason why she couldn't be an Australian in this role. Her part is not written up enough for her - she doesn't have any great exchanges with Eddie Redmayne, although there's an electric scene when she goes into a dark basement where she excels. However Richard Roxburgh is playing a local cop in a rural region of the UK and his accent is all over the place. He is not convincing as British. Combined with the Australian locations, the film loses impact for a British audience, which is its most obvious market, because you start thinking about its bi-national production.
The main protagonist, Eddie Redmayne gives a sterling, mesmerising lead performance that makes the film worth watching. Tom Sturridge is good too, though less beautiful, charismatic and internally haunting than he really needs to be. What they do get completely right is that teenage repressed love/hate symbiotic rivalry thing with undertones of latent homosexuality. Patrick Malahide does his usual thing as an unsympathetic headmaster and his usual thing is superb.
The film starts and ends well, but it does slip into Da Vinci Code/Harry Potter historic mumbo jumbo magic three quarters of the way through. This could be put down to the narrative being based on the deliberately fantastic flashbacks of one of the the boys or on the fantasy ideas of the other troubled teenager. That none of the boys are actually boys but played by men in their 20s again slightly undermines this as they are just too grown up and sophisticated.
But that's the plot McGuffin. The atmosphere, the photography, the tension and the plot outcome and the twists are well handled.
It's a British(specifically Yorkshire)/Australian co-pro with an apparent requirement to be shot in both locations. It's clearly set geographically in the North of England but the entire cast speak as if from the South. OK, it's set in an English public (i.e. private) school and everyone is posh - but the police also are not depicted as local and there's never a reference to where the school is supposed to be. Most jarring is that the scenes set on trains and on railway lines must have been shot in Australia because British trains look completely different and the carriage interiors just can't be in England. In a film that requires suspension of disbelief lack of authenticity in locations undermines the movie.
Toni Collette nearly passes herself off as English but her accent slips from time to time. There's no reason why she couldn't be an Australian in this role. Her part is not written up enough for her - she doesn't have any great exchanges with Eddie Redmayne, although there's an electric scene when she goes into a dark basement where she excels. However Richard Roxburgh is playing a local cop in a rural region of the UK and his accent is all over the place. He is not convincing as British. Combined with the Australian locations, the film loses impact for a British audience, which is its most obvious market, because you start thinking about its bi-national production.
The main protagonist, Eddie Redmayne gives a sterling, mesmerising lead performance that makes the film worth watching. Tom Sturridge is good too, though less beautiful, charismatic and internally haunting than he really needs to be. What they do get completely right is that teenage repressed love/hate symbiotic rivalry thing with undertones of latent homosexuality. Patrick Malahide does his usual thing as an unsympathetic headmaster and his usual thing is superb.
The film starts and ends well, but it does slip into Da Vinci Code/Harry Potter historic mumbo jumbo magic three quarters of the way through. This could be put down to the narrative being based on the deliberately fantastic flashbacks of one of the the boys or on the fantasy ideas of the other troubled teenager. That none of the boys are actually boys but played by men in their 20s again slightly undermines this as they are just too grown up and sophisticated.
But that's the plot McGuffin. The atmosphere, the photography, the tension and the plot outcome and the twists are well handled.