Craig Roberts wrote and directed Eternal Beauty starring the incandescent Sally Hawkins. She could make almost any script look good, but all she had to do was bring her A game given the poignant, well drawn dysfunctional family comedy/drama.
With the help of another new, dare I predict future Oscar nominated, actor David Thewlis (Golden Globe winner for Fargo and amazing in I’m Thinking of Ending Things), this pair makes you dream of Todd Solondz’s happier script moments. While I haven’t deep dived into Craig Roberts (note to IMDB: your biographies offer scant inf lately), let’s just say he has the jaded Scotsman approach to life down cold, reminding me of Solondz cynicism.
The other characters in Eternal Beauty are also terrific, notably Sally’s ‘sisters’; Billie Piper and Morfydd Clark.
The movie’s theme is normal is boring, and as a self-proclaimed non-conformist, I second that emotion. While the movie’s subject schizophrenia is nothing to laugh at, Roberts puts things in perspective by showing how nuts the general population surrounding Sally, ne Jane, really are.
I’ll definitely backtrack to see Craig Roberts act in Submarine, of which Sally Hawkins plays his mother. I have a feeling all three of these talents (Hawkins, Thewlis and Roberts) will get a golden statue sometime soon.
Eternal Beauty, Talented Writer/Director
