Greatest Days

A musical featuring Take That songs. A group of girls obsessed with ‘the boys’ in the 90s meet up again after 25 years apart to watch a reunion gig.

The premise here is a bit weird - ‘the boys’ only sing Take That songs but they are not in fact Take That, or even a fictionalised version of the band. I guess it’s like how in Mamma Mia you don’t actually see ABBA, but in this case there is a boy band albeit not one central to the plot.

Really it’s about the girls as their stories unravel both in period and in the present. And at its core, perhaps to my surprise, the film mostly works really well.

There’s some heart to it, and particularly in the final hour it centres all its musical numbers and jokes around a real emotional core that it never loses sight of.

Yes it has its awkward and forced moments, but it’s more funny than not and there are some creative set-pieces that punch above their mid-budget origins. It also follows a bit of a formula and a well-trodden path of friends reuniting, but it does it with soul and good humour.

Not a film I’d recommend right off to the bat to everyone, but there’s definitely more here than just something for Take That fans.