Solo! (2018)

This is a sort romantic version of “Brassed Off” (1996) set in the sunshine. To begin with, trumpeting busker “Barney” (Tristam Summers) isn’t devastated when he learns of his father’s death - it seems that they’d been estranged for years. He goes to the funeral though, only for a man to claim his trumpet in lieu of £10,000 owed by his late dad. On the plus side, he appears to have been left a house in Barx, near Valencia, so off he sets on his scooter to view then sell up his inheritance then return to repossess his instrument. After being splattered with paint, his first point of contact ends up being friendly innkeeper “Enrique” (Jaime Pujol) who informs him that he’d perhaps best be quiet about his family provenance, and who takes him to a ramshackle building that nobody in their right mind would want to buy. What is poor old “Barney” to do now? It seems this town used to have a brass band, so perhaps he could put his musical skills to good use and maybe repair some of the damage done to this community by his errant dad? To add to his attractions, there’s also “Paloma” (Candela Gómez) whom he befriends, but that’s to the chagrin of another Brit in the village who overhears the news about his family and determines to rock, if not entirely sink, this visitor’s boat. Can “Barney” inspire these townsfolk to forgive, forget and work together to belt out a solid piece of Bach? No, jeopardy isn’t high on the list of plot twists, indeed you could have written the whole thing on the back of a napkin in Nando’s, and the standard of English spoken in this town is as good as in most parts of London. That said, though, it’s an effortless watch with two leading actors who gel well, are easy on the eye and there’s also plenty of music from the town’s real life band to keep it breezing along without troubling any of your grey matter for ninety minutes of predictable fluff. You will never remember it afterwards, but it’s brimming with actors you might see modelling in a catalogue and some picturesque photography and isn’t horrible.