About a Boy

A movie by Chris & Paul Weitz

With Hugh Grant, Nicholas Hoult, Toni Collette, and others

Monika says:

Will (Hugh Grant) is one of those people who can not only afford not to work but who enjoys not doing so. He has everything money can buy, and he is really good at spending it, but don't we all know you often wish for what you don't have? In Will's case, it's a girlfriend; his love life isn't exactly a success - no wonder, since he admits bluntly that there’s nothing much of interest to say about him. And where can you meet a decent female? When he sees a flyer inviting to join a self-help group for single parents, he doesn’t hesitate to invent a two year old son to have a closer look at the single mothers. Everything goes well at first, and it looks as though the head of the group is ready to fall for him, but then something unexpected happens and he finds himself the surrogate father of twelve year old Marcus (Nicholas Hoult) who lives with his depressed mother Fiona (Toni Collette) who hasn't yet realised that the 1960ies are long since over and raises her son in the spirit of the hippies.

I had to look twice before realising it was really Hugh Grant on the screen - it's just amazing how a decent haircut can change the looks of a man. In the course of the movie it became evident that he hadn't simply changed his haircut; the character he plays in About a Boy doesn't resemble in the least the parts he had in Four Weddings and a Funeral or Notting Hill, where he plays the usual nice, but clumsy guy. Perhaps our sunny boy finally grew up? About time. Evil tongues are claiming, though, that he is just playing himself in this film, and given what I read in an interview, I tend to believe it. But since About a Boy is a thoroughly enjoyable movie, he may do it again. If someone writes another great script like this one, that is.

But the true hero of the movie is Nicholas Hoult who does a great job playing Marcus, the boy who gets taunted at school for his clothes and his looks. If you went through something similar as a child, you will know what I am talking about. More than once I wanted to have a little chat with Will and tell him to take the boy to get a haircut, all the more because he actually was aware of the problem but didn't do anything about it. (I later realized that he did do it in Nick Hornby's book, and this is one scene I would have really liked to see included in the movie.)

The ending was a bit sappy and unrealistic for my taste, but it didn't spoil my enjoying this movie. I have since read Hornby's book, and even though I have to say it's better than the movie, About a Boy is still a very good adaptation.

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Monika

Last changes: 12/04/04