A Long Way Down

[prettyxcool]

So thanks to some lovely friends, I was invited to this last night at Islington Vue. We got there early as per usual to get nice seats of our own choice, but what a shambles of disorganisation, as they had to allocate seats. As it was a pa*d for screening, they had to stop people sitting in seats that people pa*d for! We were told the screening was sold out, but eventually it was only about 80% full.

The ticket allocation was so, so slow! Screening finally got started at 7.45pm (having been there for just under two hours by now), and then there were 5 minutes of trailers! They were printing off tickets in batches starting from the back, at 6.15pm, and then exchanging for the print-outs.

Those who came early to get the better seats, or seats of their own choosing had to sit in those horrible seats stuck right up the top and in the corner! Screen 1 is not big enough to sit at the back. Up to row J is good, any further back the screen becomes like in your front room.

I managed to swapped my tickets for nearer the front, though, in row H. Then ran down to the front row for the Q&A, as there was no lights on for the Q&A and you could not even see their faces in the front row!

The film had a strong cast, was very intense and emotional because of the subject matter but sprinkled with a lot of humour. Pierce Brosnan was very good and so was Toni Collette and Aaron Paul, but Imogen Poots playing a spoilt rich British girl is beginning to grate a bit. The satire of a Breakfast TV show was hilarious with Rosamund Pike (Pierce's Bond girl) as his ex-co host of the show. 7/10

[funthing29]

I agree that disorganisation was really poor at Islington yesterday. They also opened the screen quite late so as expected the foyer became incredibly congested with people queuing.

I thought the film itself was OK, not as good as an audience member seemed to think it was (in the Q&A he implied people would be talking about in decades to come). It was not the comedy the marketing made it out to be and the funniest bits were in the trailer. Brosnan and Collette were excellent but Poots was annoying and Paul was nothing special. A 3 star film IMO. 6.5/10.

[Beate]

PXC, did you mean it was a long way down from the back seats?

I am glad I didn't win now! I hate disorganisation and waiting around for hours, plus getting my seats allocated. Plus Imogen Poots and Aaron Paul - yeuch.

[prettyxcool]

PXC, did you mean it was a long way down from the back seats?

I am glad I didn't win now! I hate disorganisation and waiting around for hours, plus getting my seats allocated. Plus Imogen Poots and Aaron Paul - yeuch.

Yeah, I wanted to use that pun too!

Forgot to mention about the Q&A. It was quite funny at the beginning as some Vue staff must have put on the pipe music for people to leave by, thinking it was the end of the screening, so for about 10 minutes we had this dramatic music playing through, as one of the organisers ran to get it sorted (she was sitting next to me so I know hehe), and the presenter and Nick Hornby and Jack Thorne wasn't sure whether to continue or what, and quipped, shall we stare at each other for a few seconds, or shall we just carry on, which they did as the music was not abating and seemed to get louder and louder.

[missgotty]

I got free tickets for the Islington screening and arrived to a huge line of people. Sadly I was given really bad seats at the front but managed to swipe seats for the front middle, which actually worked out better for the Q&A afterwards. Not my type of film but it was better than expected 5/10.

[RickyRaj]

Watched this on Netflix last night and it gets a 7/10 from me. Light hearted, humourous film but I didn't really feel much for the characters other than Maureen and her son.