The Beach

Getting away from it all may not be perfection paradise after all?

I first viewed this film upon its release and felt that the final third did the film down - and that the voice-over took away from the essence of the story, thus it's average. My subsequent viewings over the years would see me lament about an arcade game sequence and bemoaning that Robert Carlyle wasn't given a more extended role, yet it has become a film that sees me totally on board with director Danny Boyle's production and it's now that I think it puts the story together with poignant precision.

Leonardo DiCaprio is Richard, a backpacker searching for a bit more in life, after a meeting with pot smoking loony Daffy (the wonderful Robert Carlyle), he learns of an is...

We are lucky that the photography depicts some of the most beautiful scenery on Earth as the rest of this adaptation of Alex Garland's book is positively stodgy. Talking of beautiful things, Leonardo DiCaprio still has something of his "Romeo & Juliet" (1996) boyishness to him as he arrives in Thailand. After an encounter with an enigmatic Scotsman (Robert Carlyle) who doesn't last for long, he finds himself in possession of a map that sets himself and a couple of travelling companions on a quest to find to a beautiful paradise island that is well off the beaten track. After a few tricky experiences that remind them all that it's called a wilderness for a reason, they arrive to find that "Sal" (Tilda Swinton) has already set up camp and wit...

I have to go all in on this, I loved the book, and I do love the movie but...

OK, it's a bias 100% rating. This wasn't a good film for Leo, not because he did a bad job but because they needed a different kind of actor. It should have been Ewan. And, honestly, it could have used to be a little more like the novel, but Danny does a great job of adapting hard to adapt books, I mean look at Trainspotting, that turned out to be a great flick and if you read the novel you'd wonder where to even start to adapt it. And the video game scene needed to go, props for creativity, but it just didn't work.

So, maybe 100% was a bit too high, but despite all of that it is a really fun movie, has a great soundtrack, had some great acting.