Begin Again

John Carney is the writer director of the much admired Once, so it's no surprise that Begin Again (wisely ditching its clunky original title of Can A Song Save Your Life?) shares plenty of DNA with that effort but, despite a larger budget and more starry cast, it doesn't lose the charm of his debut feature. When boozed up, down on his luck music exec Dan (Mark Ruffalo) stumbles upon female singer songwriter (no wait, come back!) Greta (Keira Knightly – again, keep with me) in a New York bar, they eventually agree to collaborate on an album of songs to be recorded out in the open air of the Big Apple.  Told partially in flashback we also have a story strand that follows Greta’s arrival in NYC with rising crooner boyfriend Dave (Adam Levine of Maroon 5 fame – of course I knew that) up to how she ended up on said night out that leads to the two main protagonists meeting up. Some things don’t work (especially Dan’s interactions with his estranged wife and daughter), but there’s lots to enjoy here, from a scene where Dan first spies Greta playing in a bar and envisions her with a back up band represented by instruments playing by themselves to the script which has a few cracking zingers (at one point Greta says her cat enjoys her songs because it purrs, to which Dan responds “Maybe it's booing”). The songs dotted throughout the film also hit home and, even if soft rock isn’t your thing, you’ll do well to not tap your foot along to a cracking New York roof top jam towards the end. On the performance front Knightly has been a punch bag for virtually everything she's ever done (usually justifiably), but here she's excellent and can certainly hold a note. Ruffalo is well case as the shabby, but enthusiastic Dan, and James Cordon is good fun in a small supporting part as one of Greta’s best friends. Not so great is Levine, who can play the rock star quite well (natch), but doesn't have much depth beyond that and the less said about the moronic Cee Lo Green popping up as a rapper client of Dan’s the better. I would say his performance is ironically mockful, but that would be being kind. The “sticking it to the man” ending is a bit naff, but when a film based around music makes you want to pick up an instrument and / or listen to your MP3 as soon as you get home, you know it’s done a good job. Rating: 8/10.