Sometimes Always Never

Carl Hunter has graduated to film-making since his 1990s heyday as the bassist of Liverpudlian band the Farm. Following a co-writing credit for Grow Your Own (2007), he makes his directorial debut here with this droll ode to the substitution of wordplay for communication. Shot on Merseyside in magical-realism style, the film begins on Crosby beach where one of Antony Gormley's iron figures actually turns out to be dapper ex-tailor and Scrabble expert Alan (Bill Nighy), who must salve the fractious relationship with resentful youngest son Peter (Sam Riley) so the pair can locate the family's estranged eldest when he's discovered playing the game online. In Frank Cottrell Boyce's nimble script, Scrabble unites and divides, with father and son's deadpan bickering rooted in antonym tennis ("Awkward?" "Destabilising." "Confusing?" "Not confusing.") This colourfully lit picaresque is sustained by classy cameos, too: Jenny Agutter and Tim McInnerny as B&B swingers; Alexei Sayle's blarney-ish sea dog. Add a lambent score by Edwyn Collins and Sean Read to Hunter's penchant for gorgeously framed objects - toy robot, breakfast tray, swatches of tweed - and an absorbing hunt for clues takes shape. Let's face it, in a grey world, who can resist Nighy extolling the "elegant precision" of a typographical font?