Jamie passion and passionfruit!

Undoubtedly one of THE films of the year, this fantasy by Guillermo del Toro is a visual feast and a great fable which unites a typical fairytale with all the elements of a trial for the main heroine and a sordid battleground in rural Spain during the Civil War.  Rather than recount the story, I will just list some of the fine points of this very elegant work of art.  The story is a great one and even if there are many obvious references to other films and work of art, Del Toro weaves them together seamlessly and this is one of his great achievements.  Moreover, he has a Peter Jackson-like ability to conceive of and create a world that is completely his own.  The music was great and the photography lived up to the standards as well. The special effects are at Jackson level (great fairies). And then there are the actors.  Newcomer Ivana Baquero is first class as the girl Ofelia.  Maribel Verdú as the maid Mercedes does a great job in a very serious part and Sergi López is superb as the evil Captain Vidal.  A film to make you think on various levels and a treat to watch.

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The film of the stage show inspired by the story of Diana Ross and the Supremes.  Directed by Bill Condon, it is certainly watchable, well-paced and has the music to boot.  I enjoyed the movie without regarding it as being the ‘great’ musical some critics have suggested it is.  In fact, reviewers seem to love or hate the film and my stance is probably somewhere in the middle.  The story is a rather simplistic battle between industry  - the Jamie Foxx character, Curtis Taylor and Deena Jones (Beyoncé) who do make it big despite selling out and the sheer talent of Effie White (Jennifer Hudson) and to a lesser extent Jimmy Early (Eddie Murphy) who are just not sanitised enough for the white crossover markets.  We get the message early on and from then it is really just a question of when Effie gets dumped and will she ever get redeemed?  Hudson is the star of this movie and she makes every bit of the showstopping song “And I’m telling you”.  When she is on stage, we care about the film and her character, the rest of the time it is a bit like going through the motions.  Some of the songs are forgettable, Beyoncé not surprisingly doesn’t have the presence to carry her role off and good though Foxx is, I got bored with hhis Machiavellian character.  Best thing I’ve seen Eddie Murphy do in a while and yet that too in the end falls a little flat in this musical that promises to soar and really only flaps a few wings.  Hudson is however a star and a revelation.

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French fluff about a group of artists and rich bonvivants in a wealthy sector of Paris.  The story is tiré por les cheveux and much of it is tedious.  Cecile de France is the centre as a rather naive young thing from the provinces who gets to know the rich and privileged.  I liked the theatre concierge, played by Dani and the pianist played by Albert Dupontel is good.  But by far the star is Valerie Lemercier as the nutty soap opera star who steals every scene she is in.  A deserved winner of the Cesar and the saviour of this rather dull work.

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I really liked this film which garnered some pretty harsh reviews on its release.  It’s hard not to find a lot to like.  The story is most original and based on Augusten Burrough’s experiences as his neurotic mother signs him over to her shrink and he ends up living in a weird suburban palace with a bunch of psychos.  The film is about how he survives this and what he learns along the way.  For the most part, the script is full of cracking lines and strange twists.  The soundtrack of 70’s hits is great and the photography and set design live up to the excesses of the story.  And then there is the acting.  Annette Bening is a dream as Deirdre, the angry crazy mother.  One of the performances of the year from an actress who never disappoints. Brian Cox as Finch, the weird psychiatrist  also gives a very solid performance.  There is a welcome return from Jill Clayburgh as his run down wife Agnes, Evan Rachel Wood and Gwyneth Paltrow do well as the daughters, Alec Baldwin as Augusten’s alcoholic father has some nice shades in his performance, Joseph Fiennes is almost unrecognisable as Bookman and Joseph Cross holds it all together well in the lead role.  Everyone does well, but Bening (not for the first time) blows them all away when she is on screen.  Ryan Murphy’s directorial debut is a good one and provided me with one of the most enjoyable films I’ve seen for a while.  Sick, too ;)

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We’ve had the Merchant of Venice set in Nazi Germany so why not a Marie Antoinette in  Versailles but as a sort of Paris Hilton laced with 80’s punk and Pretty in Pink?  At least it is original.  There is a lot to look at and admire in Sofia Coppola’s version of the story of this Austrian child bride who became hated in France for her excesses but in fact had a strained and strange life to lead in a most affected court.  The decor, costumes and food are glorious to look at and the story is quite a good one but despite the visual appearance I felt that where this film was lacking was in a meaty storyline and more rigour in the actual storytelling.  The film drags in parts or becomes repetitive which may well reflect the queen’s life there but doesn’t help the spectator.  It seems we are being asked to wallow in the sumptuous decor too much and appreciate all the subtle lighting changes.  Kirsten Dunst is well cast in the lead role, both bridging eras and providing the depth necessary for the part.  Jason Schwartzman is nicely cast against type as the silent and inept Louis and we have a range of supporting stars to interest us from Judy Davis to Rip Torn and Marianne Faithfull.  Asia Argento as the Countess de Barry is one of the most notable.  Stuffy it may not be, but Marie Antoinette does seem to lack something although Coppola adds another very interesting chapter to her career.

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Fantasy time mixed with Peter Mayle.  In Provence.  Where else?  I won’t even begin to explain about the plot which involves a highly successful orphan stockbroker (Russell Crowe) inheriting his uncle’s (Albert Finney) idyllic chateau and vineyard in Provence and how the past all comes flooding back to reaccommodate the present.  This is fluff and dreams and the cobbled together plot and largely over-the-top characters all confirm this.  The film is watchable enough but completely unrigorous in its direction and scripting and therefore rather a surprise for us being by Ridley Scott.  Russell Crowe is forgettable enough.  What is left for us are some beautifully lit scenes of French countryside and the appearances of Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi in a small role and the luminous new find Marion Cotillard as the love interest.  This role, so different from what we saw in Piaf recently marks her out as a star.

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An independent Argentine film made by students of the University of Cinema.  It traces the relationship of a young couple from the first meeting to falling in love and moving in together and then the break up.  There is absolutely nothing new in the film from the point of view of the story but the handling of the material is completely authentic and the acting of Leonora Balcarce and Luciano Caceres is more than correct and credible.  I enjoyed this small film a lot and recommend it to anyone in or just out of a relationship.

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Kim Ki-duk’s latest.  About a couple and plastic surgery and how the woman changes her face to keep her man but discovers that she can`t also change her identity as easily as she thinks.  And then, her man also flips out when he finds out what she has done, when she reenters her life six months after her abrupt disappearance.  The film continues with this almost absurd and fairytale like descent into a type of hell.  Kim is nothing if not inventive and his use of amazing locations like a sculpture park add plenty to this.  Like Trapero, he can shoot some great scenes but again I felt that this film didn’t quite pull it off as much as 3-Iron, his last one.  Sure, he has some great things to say about the obsession with appearance and seeing modern day Korea is interesting but I came away with a feeling of mild satisfaction and curiosity rather than rapture.

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An Argentine film by indie director Pablo Trapero.  The film starts with the idyllic picture of a happy and well-off young family in Buenos Aires.  Then a tragic situation sees us reacquainted with the father, Santiago working in the bleak south of Argentina as a hand at a desolate airstrip, living a world full of men, wind, hard work and alcohol.  He is on some search for redemption, for a compass in life trying to remake his life.  What exactly happened we don’t know and how he is going to get going again is a mystery and we start to get a hint at the hell he has been through.  Guillermo Pfenning is good in the lead role and is ably supported by Federico Esquerro and Tomas Lipan.  The female characters are less well drawn.  Patagonia comes across as a character as well with some very good photography and music framing our view of it.  At the end of the day, this is a watchable and interesting film with some very good scenes and some other meandering parts that add little to the work.  It is hard to decide what to think of Trapero’s work – it has some excellent cinematography but it doesn’t quite grab me as much as I feel it should.

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