Considering the extraordinary levels of access that he's been granted both to interviewees and archive recordings, it would have been easy for Kevin Macdonald's vibrantly exhaustive documentary Marley (2012, Universal, 15) to become little more than a hagiography. Although the tone is indeed broadly celebratory (Ziggy Marley gets an executive producer credit, and family members feature heavily on screen), Macdonald still manages to delve beneath the public adulation, painting a credible and engrossing picture of a troubled youth who grew into a cultural giant, often at the cost of his family life.
Describing his approach as "more traditional" than such previous works as Touching the Void, Macdonald intertwines interviews, stills and concert footage with some spectacularly scenic views of Jamaica as he traces Marley's mixed-race roots (his father was a uniformed white man who looked at home on a horse) to find a search for identity at the heart of his passion for music. Along the way we hear of backstage troubles from Peter Tosh, witness the strange wizardry of Lee "Scratch" Perry, learn about the (up)beat change from ska to reggae that happened as a result of an accident with an echo loop, and marvel at the extraordinary power of a popular musician to flirt with politics in a manner that leads to both a teargassed gig for Robert Mugabe and an epochal onstage handshake in Jamaica.
Perhaps most moving are the memories of Marley's daughter Cedella, who talks eloquently of her father's home-life shortcomings (at one point he is seen ungallantly denying his marriage on television) while still remaining fiercely loyal to his legacy. Having picked up the baton from Martin Scorsese and Jonathan Demme, both of whom were at one time attached to this project, Macdonald does an impressive job of placing his own stamp on Marley while always allowing the story to speak for itself.
Despite a long and ignominious tradition of fine homemade films struggling to find an audience in the UK, I remain genuinely baffled as to why Outside Bet (2012, Universal, 12) did not fare better in cinemas. With its roots in Mark Baxter and Paolo Hewitt's book The Mumper, this unexpectedly charming coming-of-age yarn about long-term friendship, 80s industrial unrest and unlikely horse-racing capers deserves to find a more welcoming home on DVD.
At the centre of its appeal are a couple of reliably top-notch performances from Bob Hoskins and Phil Davis as the old guard of the print industry (portrayed more convincingly here than is traditional on screen) into which Calum MacNab is inducted. Tipping its hat toward the traditions of Ealing and the style nostalgia of Quadrophenia, this warm-hearted shaggy-dog story is drenched in well-chosen period music – Dexys, Style Council et al – and played with a sense of both fun and conviction by all involved. One speech, about a father who "never let a friend down, never crossed a picket line, and told his wife he loved her every day" had me wiping away a tear.
The only vaguely fun thing about the otherwise ear-bashingly awful Battleship (2012, Universal, 12) is a splendidly stupid sequence in which missiles are randomly fired at allocated grid references, thereby briefly reminding you that this is actually based on the super-dull Hasbro board game of yore. Other than that it's basically Transformers with boats but without Megan Fox's butt. Taylor Kitsch continues the charisma-free career trajectory that helped sink John Carter, while Liam Neeson looks for all the world like a man who'd like to be given the cheque so he can be somewhere else, thank you very much. At least on DVD you can turn it down. Or off.
Far better (although even farther from perfect) is Lockout (2012, Entertainment, 15), a spectacularly derivative sci-fi actioner that's described on the sleeve as "Die Hard in Space!" but could equally be labelled, "Assault on Precinct Apollo 13". Shamelessly recycling riffs ripped from Outland to Alien 3 via The Rock (the credits ironically cite "an original idea by Luc Besson" – ha!), this sends Guy Pearce into orbit to regain control of an extraterrestrial prison on which the president's daughter has become inconveniently incarcerated. With its solidly un-special special effects and forgettable conspiracy backstory involving some nonsense with a lost briefcase (no, really), this stands or falls on the quality of the hard-boiled quippage between its chalk-and-cheese stars, which, to be fair, is a lot more entertaining than you might expect – think The Last Boy Scout with less swearing. And in space.
