There's not
much swinging in the London of Paul Weiland's Sixty-Six. Somewhere across town, David
Hemmings is watching the Yardbirds smash their guitars, but the most exciting
thing in Gregg Sulkin's North London home is his upcoming bar mitzvah.
Four-eyed and flat-footed, the curly haired Sulkin is used to being overlooked,
his concerns drowned out by his obsessive-compulsive father (Eddie Marsan) and
thick-skulled brother (Ben Newton). But here, at last, will be his chance to
shine. Sulkin is so immersed in planning what he envisions as "the Gone With
the Wind of bar
mitzvahs" that he doesn't notice that it's been scheduled for the day of the
World Cup final. As England has as much chance of making the final as Sulkin
has of playing for Arsenal, his parents assure him there's nothing to worry
about. But as any British soccer fan will know, July 30, 1966 was not a day to
have other plans.
Weiland's
filmography includes such cast-iron clunkers as City Slickers II and Leonard Part 6, but Sixty Six is a thoroughly amiable, if
occasionally overstated, piece of work. Marsan's low-key performance saves the
father from outright caricature, but Richard Katz's turn as a blind rabbi is
broad enough to make Mel Brooks blush. Although the story is loosely inspired
by Weiland's memories of his own childhood, there's little in the way of
specific detail, and he's not above using flagrant anachronisms, like a
supermarket that pops up next to Marsan's produce stand a decade late, to set
up trite conflicts that can be resolved or more often brushed aside in the
final reel.
But
Weiland's occasional heavy-handedness is more than redeemed by the lightness of
his cast, which also includes Helena Bonham Carter as Sulkin's mother, Catherine
Tate and Peter Serafinowicz as his aunt and uncle, and an underused Steven Rea
as his kindly but oblivious doctor. The characters, particularly father and
son, outgrow their initial two-dimensionality, forming surprisingly strong and
affecting bonds. The movie's climax is enough to provoke genuine tears, and not
just from fans of the West Germany squad.