'MARLEY & ME' DOES IT FOR ME

I WENT to see Marley & Me today for the second time - and enjoyed it just as much my first viewing back in January.

I'm no fan of Jennifer Aniston, but I reckon she plays the role of a mum putting her children first to perfection.

And she's a good match for husband Owen Wilson, whose crazy nose and drawl somehow always engage me.

This film is most suited to children aged eight and over and all of my children really enjoyed it - though I wouldn't have take our near six-year-old youngest if she hadn't got elder siblings.

Hollywood does not find it easy to make family dramas which have a connection with real life.

But I think Marley & Me is one of the best of its kind of the whole decade and, as such, is a great film in its own right - though obviously not in the way that cinephiles find the likes of Citizen Kane to be a great film.

Sometimes, just putting a few smiles on faces and sending audiences home with genuine tears in their eyes is all that most people want from a night out and this is the best in class since Mamma Mia!

Having already tried my luck in Screens 4, 5, 6 and 8 with other films, today's screening also gave me the chance to see a film in the Odeon New Street's Screen 2 for the first time since the cinema's splendid refurbishment

Particularly if you pay extra for one of the premium seats the middle then this is now one of the best proportioned screens in the city, along with the likes of Screens 5, 6 and 7 at Cineworld Broad St, 1 and 19 at Vue Star City and even Screen 2 at the Electric, Station St.

For those with long memories, Odeon New Street Screen 2 is the right hand side of the old circle from the days when it was also a concert venue.

By the way, if you have legs like a giraffe, the screen in Birmingham with the most leg room in between rows is Screen 12 at Cineworld Broad St.