griz-259-175100 A movie entirely about selfishness. Everyone is so wrapped up in their own childish dramas of dysfunctionality that nothing of substance results. It's not "bittersweet" because it's only bitter. If the writers were looking for some kind of Romeo/Juliet analogy it would have to be a version where Romeo force-feeds Juliet the worst kind of painful slow-acting poison before suffering a fit of conscience and killing himself. The only two characters that rise to some semblance of "the top" are the police inspector who is too "Cluseau" to be taken seriously and the pedophile who threatens to break the legs of the boy if he is not truthful with him. A triple-tragic movie where the greatest tragedies are 1) that someone would conceive and write such a story 2) a movie company would consent to it being produced 3) that it would manage to gain a following that thought it was in any way good.There is no good in this story-line. Period. I hope it doesn't ruin the young actors who showed at least a bit of promise.

paul2001sw-1 'The Scouting Book for Boys' tells the story of a teenage boy who helps a girl he fancies run away from home. Ultimately, the unidirectionality of that relationship is to have dire consequences. In many ways, it reminded me of the sort of novels I used to write: the problem is, my novels weren't very good. So you have a naive protagonist; conflicts of interest at first hidden or ignored, later painfully apparent; stylised minor characters who ultimately seem more like the embodiment of ideas rather than real flesh and blood; and a plot that makes sense in outline but doesn't quite hold up in practice, in part because the protagonists seem to be stretched to fulfil its demands, instead of the story feeling like the entirely natural consequence of who the protagonists are. The film is set in north Norfolk: an attractive coast, but I didn't get a profound sense of place from how this movie is shot. The reliably excellent Thomas Turgoose does what he can with the material, but is limited by the lack of depth in the story. In fact, this isn't an awful movie; but it feels like a first time effort, and less than the potential sum of its parts.

colinmetcalfe A picture post card perfect movie, unfortunately like a postcard there isn't much room for the message! With me films that are almost there make me more angry than complete turkeys because you're left thinking what a waste. This is the case with TSBFB. The set up is perfect, the photography exceptional- iconic in parts, the characters well drawn with great acting from the two young central characters. The second half fails to deliver though - why? I'm afraid for me it is the script. It thins out and gets a little desperate relying on the young male leads tendency to suffer a narcolepsy attack every time the story gets into difficulty! There is no real climax and I think this was a brave attempt to not follow the formula, but if you haven't got one then you need something else and this film didn't hence my sense of anti-climax.

Ali Catterall So who was she, the girl you desperately tried to convince yourself was more like the sister you never had? The one who locked you in the toy box of her heart like some dependable old teddy with a glassy stare and a permanently knitted frown, as she parcelled out her favours in front of you? For David (Thomas Turgoose), being that "brotherly" best friend to Emily (Holly Grainger), a girl he's known all his life, just won't cut it anymore. Focusing on adolescent urges turned jealous, possessive and cancerous, The Scouting Book For Boys describes a day-glo dream plummeting into nightmare.As it opens, the teenage pals are depicted at their Norfolk coastal resort leaping between rows of caravan roofs at sunset: a gorgeously photographed shot perfectly encapsulating the giddy rush and risks of youth. For now, everything is ice creams and waterslides, sunshine and sherbet. There's even that Noah and the frickin' Whale hit on the soundtrack, and you can't get sunnier than that. Then things start turning crap: when an unwilling Emily is packed off to live with her divorcée dad, David helps her hide out in a cave on the beach. ('How to hide yourself' being a section in Baden-Powell's near-eponymous handbook.) But Emily's motives for lying low are more complicated than David imagines. And when the truth is uncovered, the film takes a lurching left turn into Hell-by-the-Sea.Director Tom Harper and writer Jack Thorne (Skins) have both dealt with wayward adolescence before, and have proved extremely skilled at getting inside those scheming little brains. If the film's adult characters behave like dangerously overgrown children, the kids think they're grown-ups way before their time. Wearing an expression like a bruised knee, Turgoose continues to build on a diminutive but hugely impressive CV; while Grainger, playing slightly younger than her actual age, and sharing superb chemistry with her co-star, is just brilliant: equal parts girlish, manipulative and naïve. Like its protagonists, this is capricious, nuanced drama; just when you think you've a handle on it, it twists out of reach like a flipping fish. Catch it.