New Moon is nothing if not an international advertisement for the hungry virtues of virginity and young people can’t get enough of it
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Theatre
A smart, prickly and rewarding view of sexual and emotional confusion
Cock
Restaurants
Kitchen W8 is a bargain for this area, if such sophistication is what you crave
Kitchen W8
Too long and drawn out but very entertaining with excellent special effects
This is a peculiar play and does not work for me. Some of it is very funny but there are real flaws
Alex has a strong powerful voice and was faultless, she is far better now than she was on the X-Factor
London,
Derek Malcolm's rating
Reader rating
Dir: Tom Vaughan.
Cast: Alice Eve, James McAvoy, Rebecca Hall
Description: Eighties-set romcom with rising star James McAvoy as a college kid who finds himself falling for a girl while fighting for social acceptance and prepping for an appearance on University Challenge.
Country: UK. 2006. 96mins
Quiz time: James McAvoy, left, with University Challenge team mates
This romantic comedy, based by David Nicholls on his popular book and directed by Tom Vaughan, is about a working-class boy (James McAvoy) with advanced general-knowledge skills honed by his now dead father, who deserts his friends to go to university.
There, he appears on University Challenge, falls in love with the wrong girl and then finds the right one. Life and love teach him valuable lessons.
Set in the Eighties, it relies almost entirely on its players rather than a justabout-sufficient but rather plonking cinematic style.
Luckily the performances are fresh and accurate enough to provide some consistent entertainment. While it is difficult to dislike this film, there's a strange lack of ambition about it that stops it being memorable.
But McAvoy is totally believable as our bright if clumsy hero, who makes a terrible mess of romancing his blonde teammate (Alice Eve) and stumbles badly before gaining the affections of his more politically conscious true love (Rebecca Hall). There are also good portraits from Catherine Tate as his worried mum, and Dominic Cooper as his unemployed friend.
What, with an excellent imitation of Bamber Gascoigne from Mark Gatiss and a New Wave soundtrack in the foreground, the whole seems to make at least as much observational sense as the recent film adaptation of The History Boys, even if it aims considerably lower.
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