Instant Favorite.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

This BBC movie is fabulous. It's a true story, based on the book of the same title. Tom Hardy is Stuart Shorter, a gifted but troubled homeless man.Benedict Cumberbatch is author Alexander Masters, who accidentally befriends him and finds him delightful company.This is a must-see for fans of either of those actors. Unexpected, real, quirky, funny, touching, and weird or occasionally disturbing, but not excessively so. Mainly fascinating.It's very well acted, and a moving film.The film unfolds in a fascinating way, and is easy to follow and understand, while at the same time being very moving. Definitely worth seeking out and viewing!

"My name is Psycho but you can call me Stuart if you want."Before his breakout role in Bronson, Tom Hardy showed his true potential in a small made for TV film, Stuart A Life Backwards. He co-stared along another relatively unknown at the time, Benedict Cumberbatch (at least outside of Great Britain). These are two huge A-list actors today who have starred as villains in blockbusters like Star Trek Into Darkness and The Dark Knight Rises among many other great films. So I was immediately attracted to this film when I heard it starred these two actors. It is a biography of a troubled alcoholic and homeless man named Stuart(Tom Hardy) who establishes a friendship with a writer and charity worker named Alexander (Benedict Cumberbatch). We've seen these dramatic films exploring similar issues of unlikely friendships done before, but Stuart gives it a unique twist by telling the story beginning from the back. Because lets face it when we first meet someone like Stuart we are shocked at their current condition and we take little time to try to figure out what may have caused this strange behavior. We see who the person is at the present and by establishing a relationship we slowly begin to uncover things about their past, and that is exactly how Alexander presents Stuart to the audience. Stuart is a rather unconventional character, and Tom Hardy plays him brilliantly. He is an alcoholic who suffers from violent outbreaks. He also has suicide tendencies and suffers from muscular dystrophy which has taken its toll on him. But most of the time Stuart is a kind man with a dry sense of humor. He tells his story in a rather funny way adding a tragicomic touch to this film. Despite the strong performances from Cumberbatch and Hardy the film works mostly because of the way the film is narrated. As we learn more about Stuarts past we begin to sympathize with him and realize where he is coming from. It isn't a great film, but it is solid and it showed the true potential these lead actors had. The film does feel a bit rushed at times and it suffers from trying to add a lot of information in only 90 minutes, making some scenes feel chopped and forced. Director David Attwood benefits mostly from this emotional true story and these two actors, who happened to be the main attraction for me and the reason why this film is getting some distribution currently on HBO. It isn't a perfect film, but it has a masterful physical performance delivered by Hardy who was just getting warmed up for his upcoming and breakout role in Bronson. I really loved the quirky approach the film took in telling this true story (which was actually based on the successful biography written by Alexander Masters), but it's far from being a perfect and memorable film. The animated scenes that Attwood decided to introduce to tell some parts of the story were a bit disturbing and took me out of the movie at times. But every time I was let down by these scenes, Tom Hardy showed up with another impressive scene and brought me right back in. It is a masterful performance and one that shows his unique talent as an actor. I am also thankful I watched this film with subtitles because sometimes it was difficult to understand what he was mumbling about, but it was still great voice work from his part. Cumberbatch played a more restricted character, but he also has some emotional scenes near the end where he proves he's a talented actor. It is a film worth checking out if you are a fan of these actors.

The first time I saw this film was actually just a coincidence. The movie that I was supposed to watch in the first place was broadcast an hour later than it stood in the paper, so when I turned on the channel I for some reason stopped zapping around and watched the film.Afterwards I wasn't disappointed at neither the news paper or the film itself - I'm actually more than glad that there was a printing error on just that particular day! Otherwise I probably wouldn't have known about it! Both Cumberbatch and Hardy are superb in their roles, and the rest of the cast are also very convincing. It feels like they actually are the actual persons they represent and not just actors, which is rare in many today's regular movies.So if you haven't watched it, see it! I loved it the first time I saw it and after eight times I still do. This drama-documentary is highly recommended.

As Mark Twain once said, 'Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction', and that is certainly the case in Stuart: A Life Backwards.A BBC Drama written by Alexander Masters, it is based on his acclaimed account of the real life of Stuart Shorter, a self-harming drug addict, career criminal (with a long history of violence), who is also homeless and suffers from muscular dystrophy.This film, made for BBC TV, directed by veteran filmmaker David Attwood, is a dramatisation which skillfully and sinuously reconstructs the events that culminated in Alexander Masters publishing Stuart's unconventional biography. In an early scene, Stuart provides Alexander with the insight into how to write his unconventional book, 'Do it backwards...Like a murder mystery...what murdered the boy I was?' So Alexander sets out in this mode, trying to piece together the depressing, shocking trajectory of Stuart's life. But, unexpected to both men, in the process Stuart and Alexander become part of each other's life, transgressing socio-cultural boundaries and evolving a genuine, if eccentric, friendship.This drama, unlike the majority of films based on extreme lives, does not simplify its subject, reducing its characters to two-dimensions eliciting cheap sentimentality. The characters in Stuart: A Life Backwards are not stripped of their complexities. Rather, they evince depth and subtlety. Stuart is not glamorised or victimised. He is vulgar, unfair, shockingly abusive, as well as sensitive, understanding and insightful. Nor is Masters made into a stock supporting character. He is at times the clear victim of middle class culture shock and has to fight his tendency to condescend. In short, they seem honest recreations of human beings.Tom Hardy engages as Stuart, giving a tough and intelligent performance, and recreates his character's extreme physical traits with little mannerism. Benedict Cumberbatch also rises to his own, different challenge as Stuart's friend and witness with understatement and subtlety.Stuart: A Life Backwards is a rare, droll, moving film that grows to understand the maddening complexity of life and subsequent near hopelessness in trying to find the factors behind someone's life. Instead, Stuart: A Life Backwards is a film about human diversity and the things we all share.