Sometimes Always Never

What a clever quirky little movie that proves when done well the British succeed where other fail.

No plot or spoilers here as it would ruin the movie but all the performances headed by Bill Nighy as Alan are superb. Bill Nighy plays droll eccentric old men better than anyone I can think of I can't imagine anyone else doing justice to this role. The last time I saw Bill Nighy in a movie was The Bookshop and even though it was not the starring role ,he played an almost Dickensian character he stole that movie

The only thing I'll say about the story is that it's about two families,both have suffered loss and both are bought together by the game of Scrabble.

The supporting cast of Sam Riley as Peter Alan's son and Jenny Agutter ,(out of habit as Sister Jullienne) well and truly in this film plays Margaret touchingly and with great humour ,this is a very funny movie ,almost a comedy but with a lot of pathos Tim McInnerny as Margaret 's droll husband is also very good. Also the rest of the cast Alice Lowe ,as Peters wife and Oliver Sindcup as young Peter are very very good.

Frank Cottrell Boyce ,who wrote screenplays for Goodbye Christopher Columbus ,Railway Man,and Hillary and Jackie among other films and television is one of the most respected writers for the British screen and it's easy to understand why.

I don't know much about director the Carl Hunter but if Sometimes Always Never is an example of his directing I hope to see more of his movies.

Don't miss this one.

I may never stop getting this film's title confused with another movie that also came out this year, "Never Rarely Sometimes Always."

"Sometimes Always Never" is a quirky and mostly forgettable little film, but it's anchored by a strong performance by Bill Nighy, as a dad on a meandering quest to track down a grown son who's gone missing. The film gives off Wes Anderson vibes, albeit much more subdued and melancholy ones. The production design gives the film some visual interest and a certain sense of style. It's one of those movies that I thoroughly enjoyed while in the middle of and can barely remember after having seen it, which is I guess my review of it in a nutshell. It does manage to build toward a modestly effective emotional pay off, I remember that much. For that reason, though it's not likely to blow your mind, the film also doesn't feel like a waste of time.

Grade: B+

'Sometimes Always Never (2019)' is a bit of an oddity, I suppose, because of its combination of mundanity and quirkiness. It tells a grounded - though, ever-so-slightly absurdist - story with a real emotional weight to it, often with genuine subtlety but more frequently with a strange sort of passivity, and tends to toe the line between comedy and drama to the point that a distinction between the two isn't really worth making. It's not like it's particularly unfocused or haphazard, however, as it certainly feels calculated. Yet, even in its almost articulated unwillingness to conform to convention, there's a sort of intangible sense that it doesn't quite know how odd it is. It's exactly what it wants, and needs, to be. As you can tell, it's a fairly difficult experience to categorise. All in all, though, it's an enjoyable one. It has a compelling central theme and a nice set of main characters, even if the former isn't fleshed out as much as you'd like thanks to a somewhat baggy mid-section. The tone of the thing also fluctuates a little. Usually, it balances the serious with the silly, making sure that both do a decent job of developing character, but there are some moments that make you wish the movie would make its mind up as to whether or not its world is actually 'heightened' (which could be pushed further, if that is the case). It sometimes sounds overly 'written', too; this isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the sequences where you actually notice the writing pale in comparison to the ones where you don't. I'll also say that, while it's well directed overall, there are some visual stylistic choices that I don't think pay off. Of course, these issues don't prevent the flick from being generally entertaining. It's somewhat endearing, with great performances and (from what came through in the final result) a good screenplay. It's not perfect, or indeed overly satisfying, and its odd tone - or general 'status', I guess - does make it a bit difficult to get a handle on. Still, it's a good effort that nicely tells a personal, rather unique story. 6/10

Just to address the marmite topic brought up by another reviewer: It was illustrated in the film that Billy Nighy's character Alan was not a reliable story teller. He liked to tell tall tales, like the one about the grandmother with the coal seam in the basement. Going back to the movie, I thought it was quirky like everyone mentioned. I knew it wasn't going to be a straight forward dramedy based on the bizarre, artificial riding in car scenes. It looked like it was done in a 1950s B movie style. Thankfully the movie dials back on that and delivers a fairly straight forward, drama comedy framed around the game of scrabble, but really about Alan and his son Peter, as they try to solve the mystery of the missing son Michael. The body viewing scene (which we don't see) was particularly odd, because we were told that Michael went missing many many years ago when he and Peter were still children. So why would they be called to identify a body? If it was an adult's body, how would they know it was him. Usually they do DNA tests anyway. Other than that weird start, and some scene involving a boat (or did it?), much of the movie follows a fairly linear format. I think it helps that every character in the movie had something to offer the movie, and generally everyone was likeable. You kind of hoped there would be a resolution of the 'mystery', but ultimately it didn't really matter. Nothing is really 'solved' by the ending, except maybe Peter wasn't as resentful of his missing brother's 'Prodigal Son' stature, and maybe Alan realized it was time to focus on his existing family.

First off, the catchy title is simply a reference to guidance wearing a 3-button suit coat, sometimes the top button, always the middle button, never the bottom button. The main character is a tailor, he gives the advice to his teen grandson

Bill Nighy is Alan, Scrabble fan with two adult sons, and a teen grandson. One son, Michael, is missing, apparently he got up from a Scrabble game and left, they never heard from him again.

Several times the script references the Biblical prodigal son story, the one son who remained connected feels he isn't getting the love he deserves and all dad cares about is finding the missing son.

The story is a family relationship drama but sprinkled with humor. Bill Nighy makes it a worthwhile movie, all the other characters could have been played by almost anyone. However it was also good to see Jenny Agutter in a small role, she was mid-60s during filming, who could forget her performance in "Walkabout" when she was still a teenager?

I watched this on Amazon streaming movies.