By
Chris Tookey
Last updated at 8:37 AM on 18th March 2011
Verdict: Offbeat British comedy
Rating: 
Submarine is another British romcom, and it’s both more adventurous
and less commercial: a self-consciously quirky rites-of-passage comedy
about a pale, gloomy 15-year-old Welsh schoolboy (Craig Roberts) trying
to lose his virginity with his comically unromantic girlfriend (Yasmin
Paige), who’s bad-tempered and suffers from eczema.
At the same
time, he’s attempting to help his depressed dad (Noah Taylor) — yes,
that’s the second depressed dad of the week — to rescue his
none-too-bright wife (Sally Hawkins) from the clutches of their
preposterous New Age guru neighbour.
Original: Submarine, starring Craig Roberts, is sure to attract a cult following
In this uncharacteristically
broad comic role, Paddy Considine boasts a terrifying mullet that must
rank as the screen’s scariest hairstyle since Javier Bardem’s barnet in
No Country For Old Men.
First-time writer-director Richard Ayoade is a talent to watch, and his film is always amiable.
Our
schoolboy hero is endearingly awkward, not unlike the hero of Bill
Forsyth’s Gregory’s Girl, and as engagingly pretentious as Sue
Townsend’s Adrian Mole.
However, there are many moments when the
plot meanders, and a few when it grinds to a halt. The style — indebted
to Rohmer, Truffaut and early Godard — isn’t truly reflective of a
modern 15-year-old boy’s culture, even if he is supposedly addicted to
the chansons of Serge Gainsbourg.
The happy ending also feels too conventionally art-house: it’s a dead ringer for Truffaut’s 400 Blows.
Because
Submarine seems geared more towards middle-aged film critics than real
teenagers and fails to deliver fully on its comic potential, it probably
won’t be a mainstream hit; but it will deserve a cult following as an
artier, British equivalent to 500 Days Of Summer — an eccentric romcom
with an original edge.
More:
Submarine: An eccentric British romcom with an original edge