Published: 09 July 2010
by DAN CARRIER

• CYRUS
Directed by Jay and Mark Duplass • Certificate: 12

ACTOR and screenwriter Jonah Hill is tickling America’s funny bone quite successfully at the moment. Hits with his grubby paw marks on in recent years include The 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, The Invention Of Lying, Get Him To The Greek, and Bruno.

If you have seen a couple of these films, you know what links them: smutty man-boy jokes abound, with fun poked at loveable geeks who always seem to come out the other side with things eventually being pretty groovy.

And while Cyrus is not purely a Jonah Hill vehicle, his comic sensibility hangs over every scene.

We meet loveable John (John Reilly) who is a best mate type of guy: not too funny, not too sexy, just a regular person who you’d be happy to hang out with. But things are not great in John’s world. His ex-wife, whom he still has a thing for, is getting remarried. John wants a new girlfriend, but hey, the other sex is scary, no?

Then along comes Molly (Marisa Tomei) and perhaps, perhaps, they can make something work. But Molly comes with “baggage” – namely, a 22-year-old son, Cyrus, who is a major spanner in John’s works.

• ALAMAR
Director: Pedro González-Rubio  Certificate: U

THERE is a lovely short novel by John Steinbeck called The Pearl in which he draws on Mexican folk tales he heard while travelling through the country. It tells of a fisherman who finds a wonderful pearl. The jewel at first represents economic freedom – and then a burden as the boy begins to suspect those around of him of coveting his find, and of businessmen wanting to exploit his good fortune.

This Mexican offering has the same haunting Mexican folk tale atmosphere of the country that Steinbeck created. 

Jorge has separated from his Italian wife, Roberta, and his is a life spent in a jungle, close to nature; hers a cosmopolitan lifestyle. When she decides to return to Rome and take their five-year-old Natan with her, he wants to spend some time before they head to Europe. Thus begins a buddy-buddy trip film with a difference – at first it is a trial for the boy and then dad (faced with his son’s stubborn atti­tude towards his Mayan ancestry). By the end, a new relationship has been born out of the fact they have simply spent some time together.