Tony Brignull

This is one of the great movies of the 21st century. You may not enjoy it but you will never forget it. It gives a coruscating view of dirt-poor, uneducated, entirely hopeless lives which go nowhere because there is nowhere for them to go except the impossibly fabled Hollywood. Trump broods over the film like the anonymous industrial landscape. A perfect miniature of rust-belt resentment where the 'star's' only claim to fame was that he won a porn Oscar in the oral section, and this he shared with ten other men blown by the same woman. We were the only couple in the cinema! A shame because in questioning how the richest nation in the world can leave some of its people so far behind, it questions capitalism itself. Steel yourself, go see it.

I didn’t rate this as highly as others. It lacked a narrative thrust for me and the mum and dad were implausibly beautiful and handsome. I felt the film had a phoney bleakness undermined by a sentimental streak. It was rescued by the little boy whose acting seemed totally natural.