areatw
'There's Only One Jimmy Grimble' is a film I used to love watching as a kid. Seeing it here on IMDb with only 3,000 ratings, a handful of reviews and a score of only 6.6 really baffles me. How is this film not better known, especially in the UK? In my opinion, 'Jimmy Grimble' is one of the best British films of the 2000s and on a par with older classics like 'Kes'.While football is very much the central theme, this is much more than just a sports film. It's a story with a big heart. A story with a wide range of emotions and themes. It's sad in parts, funny in others. Depressing yet inspirational, and all round hugely enjoyable. 'Jimmy Grimble' is everything that a film should be. Unappreciated and very underrated, this is a film I would recommend to anyone.
l-whittington
I watched this film and quite enjoyed it.I liked that Jimmy Grimble played soccer. I also enjoyed that he played soccer well. Jimmy Grimble played soccer well.I also enjoyed that he had multiple father figures. Sometimes, these father figures would vie for primacy in the same shot. For my money, Harry is the primary father figure, because he is in with Jimmy's mum, but the sad coach bloke isn't.I wish I had multiple father figures.In relation to the weird chick, I thought that she was kind of awesome. Like, I would love to go to school in Manchester some time, play soccer well, have a deadbeat coach, vie for my mother's attention with a different deadbeat (though not a coach) and then tour cemeteries with a weird chick.If I had to put her in a position, I'd suggest right wing.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
A film about football is quite commonplace. A film about young boys who want to become VIPs in life is also quite banal. But a young boy who wants to become a star in Manchester United is as brilliant as a blue sky and as pure as white snow, and there can only be one out of a great number of candidates. Jimmy Grimble had everything against him. His unmarried mother with short-term man friends was not a comfortable family situation. He was the victim of the bullies at his comprehensive school and one of the bullies was the son of the rich tycoon who was going to invest a lot of money to build a new gym for the school. The girl he likes, more or less, at least he would like to make friends with, is a pugilist and she does not like football. The only man friend of her mother's who likes him and he likes has to get unattached and detached from another liaison before being what he wants to be, the father of this boy as well as the husband of this mother of his. And yet his success will come from a strange spiritual and virtual construction he will build in his own mind about a pair of shoes an old homeless woman gave him one day when he was being chased by the bullies. The shoes of a mythical football player. Jimmy Grimble decided in his head that he is only winning, and brilliantly at that, because of the shoes. And what will happen if the shoes are thrown away by one of the bullies? That's the film, the magic of the film, the magic of football too. And a lesson is given to us at the same time. Jimmy scores three times in the final match of the school cup, the first time by himself, and the other two times by using the bully who likes him so much (Ah! Ah!), once with a pass that leads the bully to score through a wide easy opening, and the other time by using the bully's head as a rebounding wall to score without him doing anything except getting stunned by the ball. Teamwork is fundamental in football because it confuses the opponents, provided it is creative. I guess the bully did not like it after all.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Paris Dauphine & University of Paris I Pantheon-Sorbonne
CharltonBoy
There's only one Jimmy Grimble is poor attempt at very old concept which has been see time and time before. It is the story of a young boy who is small,not pretty and unliked by the rest of his class but get a chance to play for his school football team thanks to some lucky old football boots that seem to have a mind of there own. Thrown into the story are a couple of dull love stories that seem to peeter out. Although the film is unoriginal and is very predictable i would imagine that this would appeal to kids (and Man City fans). My problem with the film is that there are so many basic cock ups that i ends up looking for them instead of watching the film. Here are just some. 1.During the final the first half is played in bright daylight yet the second half is played in pitch black! 2.When the player came off for the second half , despite it pouring with rain they had no mud on them at all! 3. When the second goal goes in you can clearly see daylight through the net even though it was night time!The biggest mistake for me in this film was not any of the above but the fact that Ray Winstone put on that stupid Northern accent! Winstone is a fantastic actor but only when he talks in his normal London accent.That is part of his appeal. Ray cannot do accents.
Added to all these mistakes is the fact that the football action was pathetic. You know the type, one player running with the ball with all the other players standing still while he ran around them. That is something a Manchester City player has never done!Lazy film making.6 out of 10.
AD
