Son of Rambow, Hammer & Tongs second movie after H2G2, was shown at the Sundance festival. It got mostly excellent reviews and made big news thanks to a huge $8 million distribution deal with Paramount Vantage. But SoR failed to win any prize at the Sundance competition. Here are some of the reviews : For CNN.com, SoR is the second best movie of the Sundance festival : “An irresistibly inventive, slapstick celebration of preteen DIY moviemaking from Hammer & Tongs (“The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”). “Rushmore” meets “The Science of Sleep” in early 1980s middle England.” Firstshowing.net gives 8.5/10 to SoR. “Another film that ramped up its buzz at the festival after the first few screenings, Son of Rambow makes a triumphant debut and lasting impression… This is one of the few I’m very much looking forward to watching again.”. Cinematical : ” Son of Rambow feels as real as Will’s fantasies of flying dogs and walking planes, but it’s also as joyful and inventive and exuberant, as funny and heartfelt as every child’s dreams; it’s a brilliant celebration of the exuberance and thrill of bad storytelling, of making art, of having dreams.” Variety writes that SoR is a “modestly eccentric entertainment” though “as to be expected from Hammer and Tongs, bright and witty physical and visual touches spill off the screen”. According to Hollywood Reporter, SOR ” is pumped up with all the right kids’ ingredients: slapstick, fantasy, alienation and severe adult authority figures. But screenwriter and director Garth Jennings has slammed them all together with little cohesion, and further slackened the story with atonal nastiness and gratuitously stick-thin side characters.
