Pillion

When barbershop quartet crooner “Colin” (Harry Melling) ends up paying for some crisps in the pub for a biker he doesn’t even know, he immediately becomes smitten. This is despite the fact that the white-leather clad “Ray” (Alexander Skarsgård) barely gave him a second glance, though he did give him a Christmas card with a phone number. “Colin” can hardly contain himself and agrees to “take the dog for a walk” on Christmas Day where we get the gist of just how any relationship between these two men is going to pan out. Indeed, for the remainder of this film we see something of a combination of adoration, affection, obedience and maybe even love as “Colin” finds himself drawn into a biking community with a difference. The challenge for him - and maybe even for “Ray”, too - is to what extent he can keep within the rigid boundaries of an arrangement that teases and enthralls at the start, but soon begins to have him question how sustainable this degree of unquestioning loyalty and subservience can be as an emotional connection is undoubtedly beginning to form. Is that ever likely to be reciprocated? Would he truly want it to be? Melling holds this really quite well here but though his co-star has the best torso “V” since Matt Camp in “Getting Go” (2013), his isn’t really that interesting or developed a role. It’s all about “Colin” and a coming of age story that every parent would dread - exemplified really entertainingly here in one scene by his terminally ill mum (Lesley Sharp) who says aloud what many of us watching might be thinking about “Ray” and the dynamic of a master servant rapport involving our child. It’s a bit erratically paced and not sexually graphic in the least, really, but is still quite a sexy story that smoulders well when the two are on screen together and it might just make folks appreciate their days off more in future.