HollywoodReporter has reviewed The Goob movie stating that it “lacks coherence” but “has some lovely moments and an intense sense of place”. They also would have liked to see more of Hannah and Paul Popplewell suggesting that some of their scenes may have been left on the editing table.
Writer-director Guy Myhill makes his feature debut with this agrarian drama set in Norfolk’s pumpkin fields, starring Sienna Guillory, Sean Harris and newcomer Liam Walpole
A teenage boy (newcomer Liam Walpole) is torn between loyalty to his family and a restless dissatisfaction with his rural roots in The Goob, a British drama that’s rich in atmosphere but dramatically undernourished and stippled with cliché. A feature debut for writer-director Guy Myhill, who’s made documentaries and shorts in Norfolk where the film is set, the film’s strong suit is its insider’s feel for the landscape and working-class milieu depicted. However, Myhill’s script picks up plot strands and characters and then casually discards them in a way that’s probably meant to be arty and oblique but often comes across as inattentive. Still, getting a premiere at the Venice film festival should give this inarguably striking work a push toward further festivals before it hits the arthouse circuit.
*** In final stretch, a cohort of non-specific Eastern European farm workers arrive to help with the harvest and Goob strikes up a tentative romance with pixie-ish Eva (Marama Corlett). But, once again, rutting-alpha-male Womack plots to ruin even this small happiness, which just feels repetitious by this point in the story. Meanwhile, a subplot involving another friend of Goob’s (an underused Paul Popplewell) and his girlfriend Mary (played by former S Club 7 singer Hannah Spearritt) barely gets off the ground, suggesting something may have gone awry in the editing suite.
