Wednesday 17 November 2010

Burke and Hare - a capitalism story


I have to admit that I was torn on whether I was interested in seeing this movie or not, on the one hand it featured Simon Pegg, who I have been a massive fan of since Sean of the Dead (and Spaced but I only watched that on DVD after Sean came out.) On the other hand it also starred Andy Serkis who I have never been a particular fan off. My mind was in the end up made up by the trailer which after I saw it, I knew I definitely did not want to see it. It looked like lowest common denominator comedy which is not really my idea of a good film. Unfortunately fate had other ideas and it was the only film on at the time we had, so we saw it.


Luckily this turned out to not being a complete disaster as it was actually not so bad, the gross out element was mainly contained at the start and did not consist of much more than was seen in the trailer, and even then it was not much more than a little sidebar to the story.


The story is based roughly around a true story and centers around the two title characters as they struggle to make a living in 19th Century Edinburgh. A living they, through acts of coincidence end up making through the supply of dead bodies to teaching hospitals, a living however that is difficult given the relative scarcity of the product. They therefore decide that it may be an idea to increase the supply, in part as Pegg wishes to finance the first all female production of Macbeth for his love interest played by Isla Fisher.


Eventually, as you always knew it would, the long arm of the law (well as it is played by Ronnie Corbett I guess long is a bit of a stretch) along the way however the film, whilst in no way getting close to classic comedy, has enough to make it an average night out - not a great endorsement I agree, but much better than I thought going in.

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