Hello Carter

Twentysomething Londoner Carter (Charlie Cox, ‘Starlight’) is facing the unholy ‘trinity of misery’: he’s homeless, unemployed and single. He’s still in love with his ex, who has moved on, and all he wants in life is to travel on the tube every day to a job with people he doesn’t hate.

‘What’s your USP?’ the slick recruitment agent quizzes Carter. Unfortunately, the film struggles to answer its own question. There is the feeling that Carter should be a likeable, nerdy figure, but he’s so anodyne and victimised it’s difficult to care. First-time director Anthony Wilcox displays definite potential, portraying the misery of the modern-day London office with a Pythonesque hatred of bureaucrats and businessmen. Nevertheless, there is something unmistakeably studenty about all this: the characters are so offbeat they’re unrelatable, and in the end the film errs on the wrong side of kooky. Still, we’re keen to see what Wilcox does next.