Ruben Guthrie

2015

1 hr. 33 min.

Drama

Romance

List

60%

10 Reviews

Tomatometer

43%

50+ Ratings

Audience Score

Life is good for Ruben Guthrie. He works as advertisement executive, leads a lavish, party boy lifestyle and has a model fiancée, but after a drunken mistake leaves his life in ruins, he is forced to face his problem with the bottle.

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Audience Member

Watch it. It'll surprise you

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

01/14/23

Full Review

lenny r

Interesting story about the trials of an alcoholic in a culture that makes it hard to escape alcohol. The mix of comedy and drama gets a bit awkward at times, but Brammall brings weight to the lighter moments and lightness to the heavy ones. Nevin, Thompson, Lee, Sims and Dyer lend good support. Demitriades overdoes it a bit. Makes Sydney look amazing, while showing how awful it has the potential to be.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Rather cliched, but unfunny.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

02/04/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Brilliant movie, Brendan Cowall has done a wonderful job in writing directing and starring in this great depiction of Australia and their attitude towards alcohol

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

01/24/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Wonderful expose of the struggle with alcohol. Highly recommended for mature audience.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

02/06/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Life is good for ad man Ruben Guthrie (Patrick Brammall) - he leads a party boy lifestyle, has a model fiancée and lives in a house on the water. But he is an alcoholic and so his fiancée Zoya (Abbey Lee) leaves him with instruction that if he can be sober for a year, she'll give him another chance. Despite his hedonistic lifestyle it is easy to sympathise with Ruben given how his progress is hampered by friends, colleagues and even his family. And in this, the comedy makes some important comments on mateship and male interaction, as well as Australia's drinking culture, without being overly preachy. As both first film and stage adaptation, this work from Brendan Cowell, stands up, thanks to its backing from Destination NSW (the waterside Sydney shots are glorious). Alex Dimitriades is a real highlight, as Ruben's hard-living gay friend from uni days.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

01/21/23

Full Review

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Brendan Cowell

Director

Patrick Brammall

Ruben Guthrie

Alex Dimitriades

Damian

Abbey Lee

Zoya

Brenton Thwaites

Chet

Jack Thompson

Peter

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Luke Buckmaster

Guardian

An initially archetypal trajectory (boy loses girl; boy goes on mission to get her back) becomes something curlier and less conventional, with lashings of abrasive dialogue that recall its stage origins

Jul 25, 2015

Full Review

Jake Wilson

Sydney Morning Herald

As a writer and actor, Cowell is obviously talented if erratic; as a filmmaker he has a long way to go.

Rated: 2.5/5

Jul 16, 2015

Full Review

Nick Dent

Time Out Sydney

It's all a bit low stakes,

Rated: 3/5

Sep 27, 2017

Full Review

David 'Mad Dog' Bradley

Rip It Up

Cowell makes his feature film dbut as writer/director/producer, bringing it to the screen with Patrick Brammall in terrific, tormented form as our titular 'hero'.

Rated: 3.5/5

Jan 1, 2016

Full Review

Mel Campbell

Junkee

Perhaps Ruben Guthrie makes more sense if you watch it while drunk. Being sober, I loathed it.

Aug 14, 2015

Full Review

Jim Schembri

3AW

It might be a case of something essential getting lost in the translation, but first-time director Brendan Cowell's adaptation of his play about an alcoholic advertising man on the road to redemption is a well-intentioned mess.

Rated: 1/5

Jul 24, 2015

Full Review

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Synopsis

Life is good for Ruben Guthrie. He works as advertisement executive, leads a lavish, party boy lifestyle and has a model fiancée, but after a drunken mistake leaves his life in ruins, he is forced to face his problem with the bottle.

Director: Brendan Cowell
Executive Producer: Nick Batzias
Screenwriter: Brendan Cowell
Genre: Drama, Romance
Original Language: English (Australia)
Release Date (Streaming): May 5, 2020

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