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Probably my least favourite of the three major Sacha Baron Cohen characters, I did seriously wonder how you could construct a whole movie around Bruno. And the answer is that, well, you can't really, you just chain together a set of incidents with a very loose overall story. Which is fine, but does require the question of why this needs to be on the big screen, and I'm not sure any answer is all that convincing.

That said, there is much to enjoy here, with some of the silliest and most outrageous antics to grace the big screen in quite some time. The trademark deliberate misunderstandings result in some comedy gold, and some ultimately shocking ideas - I certainly didn't expect actual footage from the Middle East where he tries (and obviously fails miserably) to broker some peace deals. Certainly this isn't simply a case of picking the easiest targets to lampoon - perhaps in many ways some of the most ridiculous, but by no means easy. While much comes across as clearly cherry-picked in editing, and some seems a little mean-spirited (probably inevitable when sailing this close to the wind in so many places), there's certainly a lot to entertain and openly laugh at here. I'm deliberately skirting the issue of whether this is insulting to gay people, or exposing the hypocritical attitudes of people towards gay people, or both, or neither, because I'm not sure either that there is a coherent message or that one was fully intended.

I found Borat (CLoAfMBGNoK) surprisingly disappointing, though I had high hopes for it. I had much lower hopes for Bruno and ended up pleasantly surprised. C'est la vie, I suppose. Don't see Bruno if you're easily offended, but otherwise you'll have a lot of fun. Still, my opinion of this *as a movie* is significantly tempered by the fact that it isn't really much of a movie to start with, and also that it has close to zero repeat value (most summer blockbusters I'll try to see at least twice, unless they are truly unbearable or dull as ditchwater. But I had no desire to see Bruno a second time). Also it ought to have had a silly long name like Borat did, as that would have been more fun. 6 out of 10.

Skin tries to say something new about apartheid South Africa and pretty much succeeds, though it turns into a rambling and eventually rather unsatisfying film. Strongest when examining the stupidity of stupid laws - what exactly happens to someone who isn't clearly of either skin colour, when you're dividing the population into two based on that - the story eventually ends up as a rather pedestrian family melodrama with brief flashes of brilliance (the way the mother cuts down the father during his death-bed repentance is quite chilling). I suppose it is also to be commended for not showing anyone in a particularly good light - there are oppressed people here, but they're not entirely lovable underdogs and can be nasty too. Given the film is based on a true story, this is one occasion where this authenticity is valuable.

Sophie Okonedo plays our protagonist for most of the film (she's played by a younger girl for the stronger opening section) and her casting is, for me, the main problem with the film. There's something about her rather affected style of acting that really irritates me. In The Secret Life Of Bees (my review) that seemed to be because she had mental issues, but her character here - who doesn't have any mental issues - doesn't perform in a vastly different manner, and her jerky, nervy performance grates rapidly. Well, for me at least. Others seem to have thought it was a good piece of acting. Oh well. I guess I should see her in some other movies and see if I can prefer her elsewhere - but here she was plain annoying.

Sam Neill is reliable, as you'd expect. His character's ambiguity (is he a racist, or is he just trying to prosper in a stupid system?) is welcome at first, but also grates a little as the film progresses. Alice Krige does a decent but mostly unremarkable job, but she does deliver the best lines of the film (in the deathbed scene mentioned above) which elevates this performance considerably. Tony Kgoroge manages to craft a workable character who starts off loving and decent and ends up quite a bit darker.

It's nice that they tried something different for this film - despite the obvious Romeo and Juliet etc. etc. connotations, it doesn't feel hackneyed or excessively done before. Though it's less nice that they tried one of those tedious narrative devices of starting the film with a scene that should be chronologically about three-quarters of the way through, told the story up till then, and then carried on. As I've said before, you need a good reason to do this. There isn't one here. And finally, for me, the film suffers from Sophie Okonedo's performance, which I really tried to get into but just couldn't. 5.5 out of 10.