7/10
A very good documentary.
19 September 2013
MISSION TO LARS

Mission to Lars is a documentary about an English guy named Tom Spicer. Tom's dream is to meet Lars Ulrich, the drummer from his favourite heavy metal band Metallica. So his brother and sister, Kate and William, decide to take him to America to see Metallica live and meet Lars in person. Now I am sure meeting one of the biggest bands in the world is not an easy task, but it is even harder if the person you are taking has Fragile X Syndrome. Fragile X Syndrome is a complicated syndrome… and if you don't know what it is then read up about it. Bottom line, Tom will not do anything unless he wants to and he has no problem with making everything really hard work unless he does everything his own way. This makes it very hard for Kate and William to get him to his dream.

The film is very touching in places… I felt sorry for Tom, but also he brought some great comedy to the film. His straight to the point answers and his refusal to do a lot of things made life difficult for Kate and William, but made for entertainment for the watcher.

You don't really see much of William as he is holding the camera, but you can hear him talk. Kate is in front of the camera a lot looking after Tom and trying to get everything sorted… but she does not come across as very likable. It is a nice thing she is doing for her brother, but it felt like she is only doing it because she feels guilty for drifting apart from Tom over the years. Is she doing it to make her brother happy or just to help her feel less guilty? She comes across as a bit horrible to William in places too. Is she really that mean or was it just edited to make her look like that. Maybe it was just because she was tired. We don't really know. I know they were on the road for a very long time and the movie is only on for 90 minutes, so there is a lot of footage that never made it to the screen. Maybe William left out some bits that he should have showed so we could understand some of the comments she made. She says that she is doing this to make Tom meet his hero and for Tom to have a great time away… but it seems her stress is making it all harder work. She does realize this in the film though.

This documentary did a lot of good things really. I didn't really know about FXS before watching this. It has opened my eyes to it. It also shows that the love of a family can really make things happen.

A good documentary that is honest and full of emotions. It will make you laugh, but also make you wonder if the meet and greet will ever happen.

I will give this film 7 out of 10.

Kate: "Are you looking forward to meeting Lars" Tom: "No."

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