On The Road With My Family. Shopping With My Family. Watching Fighting With My Family

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Mainly because of my shift work we rarely as a family are able to go out together to do something. Life as it were interferes, But yesterday was different. Wife, daughter and I were able to take one of the great road journeys of the world for the day.

Or the roughly half hour journey from the Vale Of Glamorgan to the out of town outlet centre Macarthur Glen just outside Bridgend. One of the two.

As there were things we had to do in the morning we left around three in the afternoon, Driving anything longer than ten minutes does not bring out the best in us. The wife, remarkable woman that she is, will never win the prize for car passenger of the year. She would say I should break when there is a gap that would full three buses or say I'm too slow or too fast or wondering why I've parked in a particular parking spot where there could be others available.

And also, and my mother is exactly the same, she has an inability to judge gaps in the road. She cannot believe that the mighty Kia Picanto can go through them and yet it always does. Would she ever say "Yes husband you were right?" Well what do you think?

(Before you think I'm being sexist, I'll say this. Between you me and the worldwide web she's a better driver than me aside from oddly enough motorways. She has more confidence and self awareness than I do. I'm far more cautious - Something which daughter has caught on to)

But eventually we got to Macarthur Glen. And after parking (in of course the wrong space) we had some time to spare before the film we had planned to see started. So we did some window shopping (the plan being that if there was anything we wanted to get then they'd be bought later).

Wife and daughter made a beeline for the Yankee Candle shop. I've chatted about them before. This thing about smelly candles is something I just don't understand. And when I went in there later, well I'm not a person with a refined sense of smell, but it was as if someone had mugged my nose.

I of course went to The Works and later bought a book for just £10. More expensive than the books I'd normally buy but I'm sure fellow Plaid Cymru members would approve (It's an absolute brick of a hardback size).

Seemed suitable as it's St David's Day

And so to the movie. Fighting With My Family tells the story of the wrestling obsessed Knight family and in particular daughter Paige who turns into fighting wrestling matches in Norwich to a WWE star. Wrestling and me parted in the seventies so I'd no backstory in my head.

So I'll start at the ending. Daughter loved the film. Wife (normally the most critical) loved the film. I too loved the film. But not as much as the female fan club around me.

Let's get to my reservations with it first. Paige Knight described it as being "95% factual". Well that 5% of non factual seemed important to me. She revealed that the scene (which is widely shown) where she and her brother Zak first meet Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson did not happen. The final fight scene when compared with the actual match (which we saw later on YouTube) is shall we say Hollywoodised and I was shocked to find that the end credits reveals that the Dad, resplendent in a Norwich City shirt for a lot of the movie is actually an Arsenal fan. No wonder he did time in prison.

The WWE partly funded this film and this seems to show up in the Florida boot camp scenes. The sort of hard but fair cliché you get in these sort of movies as Paige gradually finds the motivation to progress in the wrestling camp.

But it's extremely well acted. Particularly the Knight family itself. The sense of a family no matter how eccentric and having to battle against the stresses of life. At no point did I look at any of the actors playing the family and thought they were exaggerated for the screen. Though Florence Pugh carries herself as Paige particular mention should be made to Jack Lowden who plays her older brother Zak, fighting against the agony of having almost reached his dream of becoming a WWE professional wrestler but not quite whilst his sister progresses.

Wife and daughter said they would give the movie a ten. Personally I'd say an eight. For as I said I loved it as well, just slightly not as much. And I didn't nod off either.

Until the next time.