The third film British film festival screened was “This beautiful fantastic”. The Russian speaking distributors translated the name of the movie as “Fantastic love and where to find it” (“Фантастическая любовь и где ее найти”) and in Armenian they translated it as “That fantastic love” («Այդ ֆանտաստիկ սերը»). Both Russian and Armenian versions spoiled the overall impression of the movie by changing its name. For Armenian version we suggest «Այս գեղեցիկ ֆանտաստիկան», which at least is closer to the meaning of the original English name.
By saying “This beautiful fantastic”, we don’t mean that the movie is a fantasy. Of course there is a little fantasy in the movie, but it’s mostly about everyday life and how to protect nature. It’s also about friendship and just a little bit about love.
Usually in movies ordinary people are put in unusual conditions, but in “This beautiful fantastic” it’s the exact opposite- extraordinary people do everything they can to try to live a normal life. Among the actors of this movie, are BAFTA winner Tom Wilkinson and Andrew Scott. Seeing Scott in the movie, you might automatically start to sing Queen’s “I want to brake free”, or ask the person sitting next to you “Did you miss me?” But you will do this only if you have seen “Sherlock”, a British TV-show, where Andrew Scott played a crazy villain Moriarty.
The personal development/growth of the characters throughout the whole film is obvious. Alfie, who seems to be a grumpy old man, shows his kindness and soft heart when he starts to treat Bella as his own daughter. Bella, who is scared of nature at the beginning and strictly loves orders and rules, starts to love nature and live without orders and rules.
All in all, “This beautiful fantastic” with its unique British humor and skillful actors, who play their roles with exceptional purity, is an emotional, sometimes melodramatic movie, which has pretty good visuals and impressive scenes. Alfie’s heaven like garden is the perfect opposition for Bella’s dead one. The rainy scenes and the rainbow’s appearance in front of Bella in one shot, are beautiful as well.
The music adds an epic effect to the movie. The scene where Billy shows Bella the mechanical bird he’s made is a perfect example for this. Bella names the bird Luna and then writes her first ever book about it, which has the same name as the movie- “This Beautiful fantastic”.
Melanie Sargsian
