Director: Arthur Landon.
Starring: Bel Powley, Alfie Field, Diana Quick, Mark Powley, Sara Stewart, Alice Felgate.
Running Time: 103 minutes.
Certificate: PG.
Synopsis: Lauren (Bel Powley) and Harvey (Alfie Field) find themselves orphaned, with a difficult decision ahead of them. Lauren can either accept a scholarship for an athletics academy, or she can go on a quest with her brother to try to find a better solution.
A great façade has been built up when it comes to SIDE BY SIDE. The film is visually very stunning and is beautifully shot, but despite the effort made on the visuals of the film, the rest can still not be neglected. If it weren’t for the brilliant cinematography, the film could easily be confused for a TV dramatisation of a book written by a child.
The story is very bizarre. Both parents are dead, and even though their grandmother lives with the two underage children, guardianship has somehow been given to running talent, Lauren. It is also implied that Lauren (at only fifteen years old) has legal custody over everyone until she is tricked by her agent to sign and give consent to move to a school for talented athletes.
In all of this conflict, the only saviour seems to be their unknown grandfather who their grandmother sends them to find. Off the siblings go on a quest to find a person who somehow, without knowing his grandchildren, is meant to help them out of their pickle. Naturally, the side by side walk to Scotland and short train rides lead them to develop their relationship and realise that underneath all of the animosity and bitterness they love each other and must rely on one another for the rest of their lives.
The acting is too dramatic and theatrical and, as animated as the actors get, it’s still not a fit with the film, taking away from the family saga SIDE BY SIDE wishes to create. The sometimes well-written and witty dialogue is buried in the exaggerated delivery of the words and the punchline is always lost.
The siblings’ journey is intertwined with Lauren’s illustrations and Harvey’s wild imagination of knighthood and beyond. Sadly, although SIDE BY SIDE is advertised as a family film, a lack of character development beyond older sisters being emotional, younger brothers being difficult and all adults being bad-natured, scheming creatures belongs in stories for much younger children, or better yet in a first draft of a script and not a complete film.
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