St. Vincent (2014) Review

When Maggie and Oliver move in next door to Vincent, their lives are about to change for better and worse.

Oliver struggling to fit in at his new school gets help from his new-found babysitter Vincent, who somehow forms a bond with the young boy. Teaching how to stand up for himself, which works but also gets them both into trouble. Oliver learns some life lessons which you wouldn’t expect someone his age to come up against.

Vincent likes drinking and has a strange relationship with Daka a “lady of the night” lets face it those are some funny scenes when using that phrase. Especially as Oliver doesn’t actually know the true meaning behind it, the innocence and the way he mentions it really is brilliant to watch.

The film was much more emotional than I expected it to be and I will not deny that I was very close to tears at the end. It has a lovely heartwarming story at its core, with some laugh out loud moments. I actually thought it was going more towards the comedy genre with the trailer focusing on those funny scenes. I am not saying that is a bad thing, it actually makes the film better with the dramatic edge and balanced with the comedy.

Megan McCarthy takes on a slightly different type of role to which we have grown accustomed to seeing her in, something which I throughly enjoyed. I thought she was good playing the more serious role, instead of the same old jokes. A very good buffer for Bill Murray who delivered the lines perfectly at times with his manner. Not forgetting the incredible acting after the stroke scene, as that is a difficult part to take on.

Jaeden Lieberher in his first big role really is a fantastic young talent, he held his own and you really did care about Oliver. His performance made you want to see him succeed and you felt for him with everything he was going through in his life. So it will be very interesting to see what Jaeden does in his next few films as this one is certainly a very good start.

Vincent isn’t particularly likeable at first, but he does soon grow on you especially when you realise everything he does is actually to do with his wife. Those scenes are pretty hard hitting and really change the whole feel of the film, in a good way though as it makes it more emotional and you get into it even more.

So it wasn’t the exact film I was expecting, it was actually much better and had a better story to what I thought from the trailer. Certainly an example of how a trailer can paint a different picture for what a film actually is. I must also mention Naomi Watts who is the strangest character and role, with her awful Russian accent was probably the worst thing about the film. Not a nice character at all, I am sure this could have been done in a slightly different way.

If you’re a fan of Bill Murray you have to see this one as I am sure you will enjoy it as much as I did. Always nice to be pleasantly surprised by a film you aren’t really expecting to like, I put this one in that bracket.