Just Jim

If you enjoy black comedy, deliberate pacing, and having to come to your own conclusions on plot ambiguity - think Barton Fink for example - then you're in for a treat. If you need a neatly resolved ending, you'll be frustrated. As the former I loved it. Excellent direction, photography, and score; tight performances - I'm looking forward to his next. Makes a good double-bill with Aki Kaurismäki's "The Match Factory Girl".

Diminutive Craig Roberts did a memorable turn in the BBC3 series Being Human. In Just Jim he stars as well as directing and writing the film.

He plays lonely Welsh teenager Jim, who is a bit of a social outcast. Even his dog runs away from him. Then a mysterious American called Dean (Emile Hirsch) moves next door to him and Dean is modelled on a rebellious James Dean.

He makes Jim look cool by giving him a kind of 50s American look. Jim's newly rebellious attitude lands him in trouble at school and it is left open ended if Dean is just a figment of an over- imaginative teenage brain.

This is a slight coming of age story with a jagged tonal shift in the latter part of the film. It is a little bit weird and off kilter but really does not amount to much.

It's quite a lonely film. Jim is clealy a very strange guy who doesn't connect with society until an American comes by to teach him the ways of being cool.

Then it all goes a bit weird. I can't work out which parts are dreams or real. The visions and then the reality. It's an isolated movie and it starts to look into bullying and important social issues but then goes on a complete tangent.

I'm just ending-up finishing lost. The ending is as empty as it started without it actually filling anything. I'm struggling to understand this concept and why it was done. It's a shame. Just rather meaningless despite the good original idea.

Obviously there's not much happening in that little British town. Jim tries escaping the boredom and loneliness by going to the only cinema in town where they keep playing the same old films over and over, and usually he's the only visitor. On top of that boredom he's also bullied by the other kids and, honestly, he hasn't much to offer. When that new cool American guy Dean moves in next door and tries to make friends with Jim this set-up comes across rather constructed for the sake of a plot. But the further developments seem even more unrealistic. Jim tries to come across as a "mysterious" guy but by God neither he or this film has even a hint of mysteriousness. It is one of the general challenges when depicting a boring character in a boring surrounding - the film plainly tends to get boring itself if you are not a master of subtleties or you don't bring in humor & irony. The film unfortunately lacks either of those qualities.

"I am depressed" from protagonist Jim, especially after the introduction of Emile Hirsch's kitschy cool foil, was probably unnecessary and a bit much. Up to that point, the film uses what it has to build this well balanced psychology: the trauma experienced as a victim of bullying and the subsequent introversion (spoiler free Brother Yee called it from the trailer), which in and of itself can be embraced rather than be seen as a responsive crutch to the act of bullying itself. Roberts never loses sight of this though and rides this one out nicely, even if his character is, at times, overshadowed/muddied by Hirsch's gratuitous performance. Overall, if you're a fan of teenage angst, Gen Y self-conscious, self-depreciative dialogue, and a good eye for shots and rendering, then there's plenty to smile – and laugh with in Just Jim.