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The writers (well, screenplay adapters) of The Private Lives Of Pippa Lee have gone to decent lengths to create realistic, rounded characters, and strong actors have been hired to fill these roles. In the end though, they seem to be strong characters in search of a strong story - and failing to find it. There's not a great deal of narrative anyway, and while the extended flashback structure is interesting - indeed, the young Pippa Lee is often a more interesting creature than the present-day one - it doesn't seem to fully cement the characters in the way you would expect such an extensive set of flashbacks to do. There's enough in the strong performances to keep the audience entertained, but there's much less substance here than it seems was intended. Of all the genres uneasily jostling together, probably the humour stands out as the most successful element - there are quite a number of rather enjoyably amusing moments, and it comes across rather better than the attempts at more serious melodrama.

Robin Wright Penn is a good piece of casting, as she gives a humanity and shine to a character who therefore holds our interest. Blake Lively plays the younger version with aplomb, given this is an awkward and difficult character she does an upstanding job of making the character feel multi-dimensional - to the stage that not only do you accept the intrusive flashbacks, but actually come to welcome them. Whether the two characters are convincingly the same person or not is rather more up for debate, I wasn't too sure this worked all that well, but the screenwriters could have provided slightly more explicit linkages and I think that would have helped. Still, it is a far better part in a less-embarassingly named film than that in The Sisterhood Of The Travelling Pants 2 (my review)! Alan Arkin is, unsurprisingly enough, excellent, though he could have done with being a stronger character in the present day rather than mostly just a foil. He's a delight to watch anyway, and fortunately he does get a fair chunk of screentime. Winona Ryder gets much of the best humour in the film, and makes the most of it. Maria Bello and Julianne Moore have small but quite well-formed parts. Keanu Reeves is rather wooden as ever, but it doesn't damage the part he needs to play all that much.

It's not really a good sign that only a few weeks after I saw the film, I can't really remember a great deal about it other than isolated images - Winona Ryder crying in a bathroom, Robin Wright Penn sleepwalking, Keanu Reeves with a very big tattoo, Blake Lively being spanked in a bizarre semi-porn photo shoot (not complaining in the slightest about that one, but certainly bizarre!). While I enjoyed the journey with these characters while I was watching the film, and enjoyed the performance of much of the strong cast, there doesn't seem to be a lot of substance to this film in the end - which is fine in itself, but it feels like there was an aim for substance that somehow hasn't been realised, and the final product feels remarkably aimless. 6 out of 10.

Quite a charming and amusing little piece from Mexico, Rudo y Cursi is the story of two brothers who are gifted at football - one a striker, one a goalkeeper - and their attempts to make it in the big leagues. While it follows a rather well-trodden path - early glory, hubris, problems (one brother gets involved in gambling, one in expensive things and an expensive woman) and then a downfall - the film keeps light-hearted and entertaining enough to be enjoyable and enlivening. Even the ending - whereby a situation from earlier in the film is replayed, with much higher stakes - is, while highly predictable, also well-done enough to be easily forgiven for sticking rigidly to formula. Football is by no means my thing, but the actual football here is kept to manageably small bites, and the action is in the relationships and characters.

Diego Luna - who was the one disappointment in the otherwise excellent Milk (my review) - rather redeems himself here, with a fun and entertaining but not entirely superficial character. Gael Garcia Bernal is a good choice for the other brother too - he fits the image of a certain type of football star. The two work very well together. Guillermo Francella does an excellent job as the agent who first finds the brothers, and then operates on the margins of legality in order to progress his career (or, rather, his own interests). He also acts as a part-time narrator, talking about football and life and so forth, with often witty and hilarious asides. Jessica Mas plays the obvious 'TV star/footballers girlfriend' type, and isn't all that great, but doesn't have that major a part anyway.

I didn't expect much at all from this film, and so it was quite a nice surprise that it was actually rather a lot of fun. It's not going to change the world, but is a pleasant diversion. I'm on quite a good run still with Mexican films, it seems (La Zona (my review), Blue Eyelids (my review), now this...) A solid 7 out of 10.