‘Idle’ being the operative word of Mark Simon Hewis’ call-centre comedy, which has been on hold since 2012 following distribution difficulties. Sadly, the film itself echoes the frustrating experience of waiting in an endless helpline queue.
The contrived premise sees homeless wage slave Dan (Tom Hughes) forced to live in his workplace, pet cat secretly stashed in the ceiling – a would-be surreal exaggeration of twentysomething career inertia undone by flat visuals, a plodding pace and a trite love-triangle storyline.
Yet this also fails as a post-Gervais observation piece, with little feeling for office politics and an unconvincing, sparsely populated call-centre set.
