Paranoid Park

Director: Gus Van Sant
Cast: Gabe Nevins, Daniel Liu, Taylor Momsen, Jake Miller
Running time: 90 minutes

Plot: Alex (Nevins) is a teen who likes skatboarding but isn’t very good at it — he’s not ready for Paranoid Park, a skate park built illegally by local street kids. Haunted by the guilt of his unintentional involvement in a man’s death, Alex decides to write a letter of confession.

I imagine this will be a polarizing film. I don’t just mean because it’s Gus Van Sant: if you don’t like voyeuristic takes of beautiful, unknown teenagers, long, pointless shots of people walking, driving, or sitting, and plenty of slo-mo, why did you pay for the ticket? Rather, seeing the reaction the film got at Cannes (it won the 60th Anniversary Prize), it’s obvious that some people will love the performances and the audiovisual aesthetic; others will find the whole thing unconvincing, pretentious, and disjointed.

For mine, this film revisits too much of Elephant’s ground, without doing it quite so well. Once more, we’re in a high school in Portland. Again, grisly death lies at the heart of the drama. This time, though, we’re focused almost exclusively on one teen, Alex, and one accidental death.

What made Elephant work was the ad-libbed, strangely-naturalistic-yet-dreamy portrayal of the commonplace school day, juxtaposed with the horror of a shooting spree. The impact comes from the very ordinariness of the school interrupted by a terrifying, monstrous act. On some level, it taps into the fears of everyone.

In Paranoid Park, I found I couldn’t really share Alex’s pain: despite the awful outcome of his actions (I won’t spoil it), we can see that there was nothing malicious in him, and it really could have happened to anyone. It’s hard to feel sorry for him when he could easily ’fess up. Maybe we need to understand better what he thinks the consequences would be.

And it is perhaps this that makes Alex a little unbelievable: he won’t crack under pressure from the police, and yet he consistently lacks nerve in other settings. Although some have praised Nevins’ verisimilitude, I found his wavering narrative and quavering voice fairly annoying and unconvincing. The less said about Momsen's self-conscious performance, the better.

Meanwhile, the plot seems unnecessarily splintered, and, rather than build character or atmosphere, many of GVS’s trademark lengthy shots just seem here to be scrabbling for an excuse to round out an eclectic but unsatisfying soundtrack. Further, I found the original score wearing and overweening.

It all adds up to a very long 90 minutes.

Verdict: Only for GVS fans. In the meantime, if you need a fix of him in this mode, you’d be better off rewatching Gerry, Elephant, or even Last Days.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

Director: Andrew Dominik
Cast: Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck, Sam Rockwell
Running time: 160 minutes

Plot: Jesse James (Pitt) has mostly retired from his outlaw ways, with the members of his gang either dead, in gaol, or alienated by his increasing paranoia and unpredictability. Robert Ford (Affleck), obsessed with James from his youth, manages to inveigle his way into the gang and his hero’s confidence. Later, having been arrested for the murder of Wood Hite, Ford negotiates a Governor’s pardon in return for killing James.

A Western with a high-profile star and a green director, filmed in 2005 and originally slated for release in 2006, Jesse James was showing good form early for this year’s Razzies. You might well have assumed that Australian Andrew "Chopper" Dominik had bitten off more than he could chew on his second directorial outing. Imagine my surprise, then, to find that this film is almost perfect.

Based on Ron Hansen’s 1983 novel, the film poetically, almost languorously, charts the intersection of the lives of Jesse James and Robert Ford, from the Blue Cut train robbery until their deaths. The knowledge that Ford must eventually kill James brings an acute tension to the film: we hang on the characterization (why did Ford betray James?), and we wonder just when it’s going to happen. This lends special moment to every scene with the leads.

And what performances the leads give! Brad Pitt does his finest work since 12 Monkeys: his James is believably conflicted, a naturally generous man whose largesse is swamped by a growing, terrifying paranoia. All this is conveyed with merciful and uncharacteristic understatement. Casey Affleck is on unprecedented form. He spent two and a half hours of making me hate his whining, shifty, greasy Judas, before, in the dénouement, managing not only to pick up dream-boat Zooey Deschanel, but even to have me pity him.

Meanwhile, the supporting cast is also excellent. Sam Rockwell is brilliant and painfully pathetic as Charley, Robert Ford’s older brother. Sam Shepard (Frank James), Paul Schneider (Dick Liddil) and Garret Dillahunt (Ed Miller) make their gang members very memorable with relatively little screen-time. They deliver the eccentric dialogue in an engaging, natural way.

All of this is played out in a visually spectacular world. Seeing the film with essentially no prior knowledge, I was surprised by the steely, cold beauty of the landscapes (Roger Deakins is DoP), which evokes the dream-like mythic atmosphere required for any James pic — even if here the myth is freshly reimagined and recast. Curiously, some shots (and particularly some action scenes) recalled Gladiator, and I wasn’t surprised to see that Ridley Scott had a Producer credit.

Moreover, the exquisite visuals are matched by the soundscape: this is possibly the best film score I’ve heard this year. iTunes here I come!

Verdict: A grand and beautifully shot account of the ignominious end of the West’s best-loved villain. Loses a star for unnecessarily rambling in Wood Hite’s story, but certainly one to watch, even if you don’t like Westerns.

This is England

Director/Screenwriter: Shane Meadows
Cast: Kieran Hardcastle, Stephen Graham, Thomas Turgoose, Joe Gilgun
Rating: MA15+
Running time: 102 mins

Plot: Shaun (Turgoose), a working-class boy whose father has been killed in the Falklands War, is socially isolated until he falls in with a group of broad-minded skinheads led by Woody (Gilgun). When hardline Combo (Graham) is released from prison and comes looking to recruit Woody and his gang to the ideals of the National Front, Shaun thinks he has found a new way and place to belong in the world.

This partly autobiographical film works as an antidote to nostalgic 80s period pieces. This is the ugly side of Thatcher’s England, thrown into relief by the tragedy of the life of one pre-pubescent boy.

This is what makes this film work so well: while the broader political concerns provide an important backdrop, the story remains intensely personal. We feel for Shaun, and we immediately warm to Woody and his gang. They look frightening, with their tats and skinhead uniforms, but they’re just a bunch of young people who’ve banded together and look after one another — and Shaun — extremely well.

This subculture provides the occasion for some excellent, eccentric make-up and costuming, and one of the best soundtracks I’ve heard outside a Tarantino picture.

It is only when Combo arrives on the scene that we see the darker side of the skinhead scene. Combo is angry, racist, and violent. Graham has a tremendous, intense, and menacing on-screen presence. He and Meadows, however, are clever enough not to allow him to be a monster. His performance is also profoundly touching: we have hints of the difficult life he has led, while Shaun’s youth, passion, and disingenuousness allow Combo the space to be tender and vulnerable.

Surprisingly, Turgoose’s performance shines alongside Graham’s. It is measured and naturalistic — a completely believable portrayal of a boy who is angry and sad, who desperately wants to belong, and who is too young to understand the motives and politics of his mentors.

And as the film progresses, the politics come more clearly to the fore. This is a case study, in a way, of how uneducated and disenfranchised people can be drawn into dangerously jingoistic idealism. Little has changed: today’s politicians still divert attention from problems at home by manufacturing conflicts abroad, and by demonizing various groups in society. In its climactic scene, the film draws attention to the painful irony that white supremacist skinheads drew aspects of their subculture from black Jamaican rudeboys: definitions of ‘the other’ can always be twisted to serve the purposes of the powerful.

The film builds a threatening atmosphere, which lingers hauntingly long after the credits. It is difficult to know how much Meadows is trying simply to provide a period slice-of-life, and how much he wants to warn contemporary viewers about the rise of strong right-wing sentiment. Certainly we’re invited into the drama. Shaun’s story has plenty of loose ends, and we fear for what he’ll become. What rôle will he play in the titular England, and whose England will this be?

Verdict: An intelligent, moving character study with excellent performances. Will make you ask, “What is England?”

A week in movies

I’ve gone a bit beserk this week and seen six films. I’ve decided to do a full-scale review of only one (This is England), partly for the sake of time, and partly because it’s a film I that people might not immediately think of seeing, and yet it’s one of the best films I’ve seen this year. In no particular order, here are the other five:

Die Hard 4.0
Director: Len Wiseman
Cast: Bruce Willis, Justin Long, Maggie Q, Timothy Olyphant

I’m assuming that if you’re going to see this, then you’re familiar with the Die Hard franchise. In that case, you know what you’re going to get. It’s faithful to the feel of the earlier films — wrong place, wrong time for straight-shooting, quip-spitting hard-nut John McClane — but with bigger stunts and more unbelievable use of computers. Fans of stuff blowing up will particularly like a couple of vehicle show-downs: (a) cop car vs helicopter and (b) semi-trailer vs F-35B jet.

In all, a little OTT for me, and a reminder of why the action genre has moved into more intelligent territory since the 80s. Bring on the new Bourne!

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Sicko
Director: Michael Moore
Cast: A bunch of sick Americans, and a lot less of Moore than you might think

Moore’s back-catalogue of docuganda films will probably determine whether you see this or not, but to my mind this is a superior film to his two previous efforts (which, by the way, I loved).

Bowling for Columbine was best when it focused on two of the survivors of the massacre who were still carrying around Walmart’s bullets in their bodies. Farenheit 911 really hit its stride in the latter half, where Moore dropped the wild conspiracy theories and focused on the plight of one woman whose son had been killed in Iraq.

In Sicko, Moore seems to have realized that his work is most powerful when he takes a back seat, and lets others do the talking. Thus this film looks at the lives of a number of Americans who have health insurance but are not cared for. The main point — that it is disgusting that the US healthcare system should be held to ransom by money-hungry insurance agencies — is clearly and compellingly made, even for those who might want to argue that Moore has been very selective in whom he interviews. There is still one indulgent stunt, which you’ll either love or hate: Moore takes some people who were permanently injured in the 9/11 clean-up first to Guantanamo Bay, then to Cuba, in order to get the medical care denied them in the US.

It’s certainly a film to make you thankful for free universal healthcare in this country — and nervous about any moves towards privatization!

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Black Sheep
Director: Jonathan King
Cast: A bunch of Kiwis you’ve never heard of

The concept for this is brilliant: on a farm in New Zealand, some genetically engineered sheep have gone badly wrong, becoming flesh-eating zombie-sheep. When they bite humans, the humans transform into psychotic half-man, half-sheep monsters. In the midst of all this are placed a man who is terrified of (normal) sheep, and a couple of vegan hippies who want to shut down the genetic engineering programme. Throw in special effects by Weta, and all the elements of a classic are right there.

Unfortunately, the film isn’t quite played right. It could have been a natural successor to Bad Taste if the camp-schlock aspect had been ramped up. Otherwise, it could have been played as slightly-off-the-wall-but-seriously-frightening, if the director and actors were up to it.
Regrettably, though, it sits uncomfortably between two chairs. Shame such a great concept was squandered!

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Knocked Up
Director: Judd Apatow
Cast: Seth Rogen, Paul Rudd, Katherine Heigl

This is not the kind of film I would usually go to see: I can’t stand all the recent gross-out comedies and frat pack fodder — thoroughly yawn-worthy. When I saw the shorts for this film, I assumed it just fit in that category.

What changed my mind, however, was when I heard a positive review from a woman who resembles Penelope Keith in age, appearance, and voice. Clearly this was more than the shorts suggested.

And it is. The film explores some real adult-relationship issues, sort of. How do you deal with losing your independence when you’re a parent? What does it take for this generation to grow up? Are children a strong enough bond to bring/keep a couple together?

But there is nothing hugely insightful here, and the whole film is punctuated with the kind of gross comedy that I just don’t find funny. For example, the male lead and his slacker housemates are building a website called fleshofthestars.com, which lists timecodes for movies where stars get their kit off. Hilarity ensues, etc.

Still, the film seems to have pleased an unusual cross-section of society. Just not so much for me.

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Rogue
Director: Greg McLean
Cast: Radha Mitchell, Michael Vartan, Sam Worthington, Stephen Curry

Don’t let the distribution details for this film put you off. When I saw that it was only playing in a few cinemas, and even then at odd hours (I had the choice of midday or 9.40pm in the city), I thought it must be a dog. But I was too big a fan of Radha Mitchell to let it pass, and besides, I needed to use my cinema cash somehow.

I kept expecting the film to disappoint, but it never did. It follows the genre arc: set-up where we meet the characters, false scares because we know what’s coming, gradual reveal of the monster, final showdown between human and human-eating stars. But it does it well: the actors aren’t hokey, and we care enough about the characters that we don’t really want them to be eaten (mostly); the crocodile is not supernatural — we’re left with the impression that this really could happen; the effects aren’t dodgy; the scares are well staged and well paced so that the tension keeps billowing up until the final showdown. I found the ending a little disappointing, but I suppose it has to be sold in the US. I hope there’s an Australian director’s cut for DVD.

In short, this is simply the best underwater predator film I’ve seen since Jaws. It’s really worth watching!

La Môme, a.k.a. La Vie en Rose

Another biopic about a larger-than-life 20th-century musician, which I was only really tempted to watch because it is viewed not (ironically) through Hollywood's rosy lens, but with the French eye that generally leads the audience to spiral as deep as possible into despair. I like that, as a rule.

But it must be said at the outset: this film is all about Marion Cotillard. I’m sure I first saw her in the Luc Besson Taxi franchise, but I must admit I don’t remember. It wasn’t until 2003’s Jeux d’Enfants (Love me if you dare) and Big Fish that I thought she was Someone Worth Watching.

In La Môme, she is completely transformed for the title rôle: the hair, the face, the voice, the gait! Cotillard appears to be channelling Piaf, and there’s something magnetic about her performance that recalls Piaf’s legendary stage presence. She bravely manages to present a rather flawed Piaf, injecting an at-times-unlikeable character with admirable pathos.

It’s a shame the film, directed by the relatively inexperienced Olivier Dahan, doesn’t provide the proper setting for such a towering interpretation of one of France’s best-loved singers. The narrative structure is unnecessarily complex, flitting from era to era with no discernible logic. To an extent, this exposes the workings of the artifice: it is hard to suspend one’s disbelief when one is constantly trying to orient oneself in the schizochronic world.

Therefore we lose to an extent the proper development of the character, and the attendant emotional journey. Indeed, it is only in the film’s final moments that we learn one of the most important elements of Piaf’s real-life character arc. This is curious choice, matched by the decision to dwell lengthily on Piaf’s 20s, and skip the war.

Nevertheless, I have to rate this as my second-favourite film of the year so far. Admittedly, this goes against the grain of my general scepticism of French cinema, but Cotillard’s tour de force really won me over.

28 Weeks Later

I've never made a secret of my eclecticism: I'm happy to discuss my appreciation of Sterne and Wittgenstein, along with my addiction to Neighbours.

One of my guiltier pulp pleasures is horror movies. I'm not talking about the new crop of sickening gorno, nor about the B-grade schlock of most 80s slashers. But, much like sci-fi, horror done right is a genre that confronts humanity with an unflattering self-reflection: as we peer into horror's glass, we recoil at the sight of Caliban leering back.

2002's 28 Days Later was a very intelligent piece of horror. It was part-Prometheus, part-Triffids, and a thorough thrill. (I'd recommend watching it on DVD, then getting the full experience of the sequel in the cinema!)

While folks may once have shivered at the sight of powerful brain-sucking zombies lumbering largo into view, Garland and Boyle delivered creatures far more likely to terrify the cynical young: humans infected with the Rage virus — hyperkinetic, acid-fuelled, with a nasty tendency to projectile-vomit blood and, er, bite. Hard.

Despite a complete change of personnel, 28 Weeks Later is a fitting follow-up. Since 2002, there has been quite adequate horror in the real world: the SARS virus threatened (threatens?) not just an isolated island, but the whole globe; the West has been plunged deeper into an unending conflict with Bush's unseen 'Enemy'.

And American hubris is neatly needled in this film: the US military is sent to clean up the ruins of Britain, but merely manages to live up to its real-world track-record. Happily, this also gives occasion for the addition of some serious hardware, not to mention what is surely the best helicopter-related splatter yet committed to celluloid.

Some of the acting is not quite on par with that of its lower-budget forebear, but the tension still runs high, and we're treated to the same frenetic editing, rich make-up, and thumping, screaming, squelching soundtrack. More haunting images of an abandoned London are still moving, despite losing some of the wow-factor of the first film.

Most satisfyingly, the sequel also shies away from the saccharine or melodramatic coda that sours most American horror. The stage is set: we shall see if the concept can be stretched to 28 Months Later.

The Science of Sleep

It irks me that I don't have time to review this properly, but let me say that this is hands-down my favourite film of the year! (Of course, Transformers isn't out yet.)

This is Michel Gondry's follow-up feature to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind — one of my favs of 2004 (despite the fact that it became cool to say so). Gondry also wrote the film, so it's no surprise that he has created for himself in a series of dream sequences the perfect opportunity to showcase his trippy imagination, which he brings to life through stop-motion and other animation techniques. (The French title is La science des rêves — the science of dreams.) The art in the film is so much a magical presence that the art department is rightly billed in the credits immediately after the cast.

The plot that tenuously holds it all together is a love story between Stéphane (Gael García Bernal) and Stéphanie (Charlotte Gainsbourg), both of whom I'd be happy to watch for a couple of hours, even if they were just mowing their lawn. Gainsbourg in particular does a believable, affecting job with the unusual subject-matter, and with a character about whom we're not quite sure how to feel. Indeed, the ambiguity of the characterization of both protagonists plays with our sympathies, and sets up what I think is simply a perfect ending.

It's a film that demands multiple viewings for a full appreciation, and I shall be anxious to watch it again when it comes out on DVD (unless I can get to the cinema again between now and Thursday). I beg you, though, watch it now, before it disappears from cinemas all together, and before it gains a cult following as the next hip thing!

300

Released: April 5, 2007
Rated: MA
Director: Zack Snyder
Writers: Zack Snyder, Kurt Johnstad, and Michael Gordon, from the graphic novel by Frank Miller
Starring: Gerard Butler, Lena Headey, Dominic West, David Wenham, Rodrigo Santoro
Running time: 116 minutes

Plot: It is 480 BC. The Persian emperor Xerxes (Santoro) has assembled a huge army and stands poised to invade those Greek city states that have not yet submitted to him. The Spartan king Leonidas (Butler) leads his eponymous three hundred hoplites north to intercept Xerxes at the pass of Thermopylae in central Greece, hoping to hold out for reinforcements from Sparta and the rest of the Greeks.

The Battle of Thermopylae is one of those rare historical events that, simply by virtue of its grandeur, requires no fictitious augmentation to establish its own mythos. It has become a byword for courage in the face of insurmountable odds, for patriotic sacrifice, and for sheer bloody-mindedness. At Thermopylae, Leonidas saw a golden opportunity for immortality, and he grasped it.

The Spartan king (along with several thousand free Greeks and slaves) held out long enough for Athens’ navy to be mobilized; Xerxes was eventually repelled; the major Greek states remained free of Persian rule, and, most importantly for the history of the West, came to ally themselves more closely, thereby creating the conditions for the establishment of Alexander’s empire. It is so extraordinary a story that it is surprising that Hollywood has not portrayed it more often.

Frank Miller’s graphic novel, 300, takes the bones of Herodotus’s account and fleshes out the mythology. Miller’s Spartans take off their clothes and take on a pathologically disciplined belligerence. The near-nude warriors are obscenely muscle-bound, but the homoeroticism that should inhere in their Herculean physiques is dampened by their tendency to hack their opponents to bloody bits. It seems like the perfect source for a film, so one wonders why the project didn’t attract a more hefty budget, or a bigger-name director than Zack Snyder.

Snyder’s 2004 Dawn of the Dead remake was one of my favourite films of that year, and he brings the same music-vid-honed skills to bear on the style of 300. Shot almost entirely against blue- and green-screen, the film’s extraordinary (and source-faithful) visuals lend it an otherworldly feel that only increases our distance from the historical Thermopylae.

Regrettably, however, the desire to ‘go mythic’ also distances us from the men at the centre of the film. Dilios's (Wenham) irritating voice-over makes much of the Spartan camaraderie, claiming that, “Although few Spartans fell, each one who fell was a friend.” We need the voice-over to tell us, because we don’t feel it. When mythic-histories work (think Braveheart or Gladiator), it’s because the world-changing events simply provide the dramatic backdrop for very human stories. With 300, however, there’s scant incentive to care for the characters, despite the insistence of the overbearing score that we really should.

The actors are solid (as thesps, not just physically), but the Spartans they play are mere types, spouting worthy and overblown dialogue, in between bouts of stylised and claret-soaked hack-and-slash. 2005’s adaptation of Miller’s Sin City should have been instructive here: the film worked because the characters were as skilfully drawn as the visuals.

There are some awesome moments in 300, as the freaks that populate the ranks of Xerxes’ army — some of whom would seem more at home in Middle-Earth — come out to test the Spartans’ mettle. (Xerxes himself is a giant, androgynous aberration.) But even the fight scenes are somewhat diminished by Snyder’s incessant ramping up and down of the film speed: there’s simply too much slo-mo. For mine, the whole thing is a slightly messy fumble of a golden opportunity.

Verdict: Granted, it’s not a monstrosity like Troy or Alexander, but it’s no Gladiator, either. Still, the look of it probably warrants the trip to the cinema, provided you can cope with the highest number of involuntary amputations since the showdown at the House of Blue Leaves.

TMNT

Released: April 5, 2007
Rated: PG
Writer/Director: Kevin Munroe
Voices of: Chris Evans, Sarah-Michelle Gellar, Mako, Patrick Stewart, Zhang Ziyi
Running time: 87 minutes

Plot: An unspeakably convoluted set-up sees an immortal-warrior-turned-nabob Max Winters (Stewart) raise to life four petrified former generals whom he recruits along with the Foot Clan to capture thirteen monsters. Sending these beasts through an interdimensional portal will somehow save the world and restore Winters’ mortality, or something. Meanwhile, The Shredder’s defeat has left the Turtles directionless, and their familial bond is weakening, being particularly frayed by rivalry between Leonardo and Raphael.

It is almost inevitable that this film fall foul of the success of its pre- decessors. In the late 80s and early 90s, there was nothing more hip than a bunch of wise-cracking mutant anthro-turtles whose penchant for whooping bad-guy-ninja butt was exceeded only by their lust for pizza. Now irresponsible teenagers could be heroes too; their dorky cool (it was the 80s, people!) changed the way we spoke, the way we thought of authority figures, and the way we fought in the playground.

But the franchise that launched a million lunchboxes was really a product of its time, and TMNT doesn’t quite manage to translate the concept into the dark world of the noughties’ New York.

This is the Turtles’ first CG outing, and with the new technology has come a new look and feel. Winters and the Foot warriors are huge, flexible triangular shapes, as if pizza slices were the animators’ anatomical guide; April (Gellar) borrows a little too much from the later incarnations of Lara Croft. The Turtles themselves look and move more than ever like frogs, while their thirteen beastly nemeses resemble absurdly out-of-place rejects from Monsters, Inc. Against a distinctly un-comic-like cityscape, these characters form an uneasy pastiche that makes it difficult to believe in the remodelled Turtles universe. This is exacerbated by some terrible lip-synching and bored-sounding voice-work on April and Casey (Evans).

Nevertheless, the few times we see the Turtles in butt-kicking action, their movement is enjoyable and fluid enough. It still seems, however, that some opportunities for awesome set-pieces are missed, particularly as the film builds towards its climax. It feels like some violence has been excised to preserve a US PG rating. (One can only hope that the video game (for which the film might well be a long advertisement) allows for more bloodletting!)

More irritatingly, the film never ceases to flog the staples of American kid-flicks. At the movie’s heart is a sickeningly didactic refrain about the importance of family: Splinter (Mako) forbids the Turtles to fight the baddies until they have resolved the conflict between themselves; a showdown between Leo and Raph results in the former being captured and imprisoned. Obviously the remaining Turtles must band together to save him. Cue repentance, forgiveness, reconciliation, group high-fives, and schmaltz à gogo.

It is clear, therefore, that this is film is squarely aimed at children; it’s a shame there’s so little on offer for their parents. I’ve no doubt that kids will overlook the tortuous plot and the animation shortcomings, and that parents will be pestered to shell out for a fresh round of Turtles merchandise come the new school term. For mine, though, TMNT fails to recapture the original’s magic. Dare I say it? Oh, all right. “Cowabungle, dudes.”

Verdict: An overly clean and didactic take on the Turtles. If you have happy memories of the 80s series, it might be best to steer clear.

Becoming Jane

Released: March 29, 2007
Rated: PG
Director: Julian Jarrold
Screenwriters: Kevin Hood, Sarah Williams
Starring: James McAvoy, Anne Hathaway, Ian Richardson, James Cromwell, Maggie Smith
Running time: 116 minutes

Plot: The humble financial circumstances of Jane Austen’s (Hathaway) family are at odds with her ideal that marriage should issue from affection rather than from pecuniary interest. This creates tension when the penniless rascal Tom Lefroy (McAvoy) arrives in the Hampshire countryside and begins an illicit romance with Jane: will the pair face poverty and public opprobrium as they follow their hearts, or will sense prevail as they find wealthy spouses?

Like Austen herself — variously described as a genius of English literature, and as “a very incomplete and rather insensible (not senseless) woman” (so Charlotte Brontë) — Becoming Jane will likely polarize viewers. Austen purists shall probably dismiss the film as speculative nonsense, an inexpert reshaping of the author’s life into the image of her own creatures. Those who are willing to treat it as a largely fictive romcom, however, shall enjoy a very diverting couple of hours.

The film appears to be set in the same kind of timeless utopia as Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibility: the leads are too beautiful to be true; the sets are sumptuously lit; the costumes belong to no definable era, and are seemingly impervious to dirt, however much their wearers traipse through the shiny streets of town, or even the sodden Hampshire woodlands. Television (and Kinky Boots) director Jarrold handles well his wider frame, and we’re treated to some beautiful exteriors, as well as to some close-up details: a lingering look at the period transport; a disorienting contemplation of raindrops on a window.

The screenwriters are clearly fans of Austen’s work, and have fashioned for their Jane a life less ordinary than the one that history records for the enigmatic author. The superb support cast do the excellent job one might expect with their characters, who are slightly less grotesque caricatures of early 19th-century English society than those who populate Austen’s literary world. The film is carried, however, by Hathaway and McAvoy: ultimately the viewer’s assessment will rest on how they view this pair’s romance.

Hathaway I found surprisingly sympathetic, despite my incredulity that an American should be chosen for the rôle. Her Jane is witty and forthright, yet naïve enough to be vulnerable. In her insistence that she might “live by her pen”, however, she does fall victim to an anachronistic hint of proto-feminist ideology, which seems curiously out-of-place against the backdrop of the central conceit of both Austen’s novels and of the film itself, namely, that marriage to a wealthy man is a highly desirable state.

There’s no denying her chemistry with the deliciously charming McAvoy, but I for one found Lefroy a thoroughly unappealing character — much more Wickham than Darcy. We first encounter him in London, frequenting bars, boxing clubs, and bordellos, before he is ‘exiled’ to the country. His boorish contempt for the society he finds there, and not least for Jane herself (whom he seems to be seeking to corrupt, through both his salacious talk and his recommendation of the scandalous Tom Jones), hardly commends him to the audience’s affections. Indeed, I came to long for Jane to respond rather more favourably to the attentions of the dull — but wealthy and respectable — Mr Wisley (Laurence Fox). We learn belatedly of Lefroy’s commitment to his family, but this is not quite enough to redeem him.

Thankfully, however, history is on our side: we know that Austen will die single, happily better off without Lefroy, whatever the deceptions of her heart. This fortunate outcome is only slightly marred by the film’s endeavour at this point to reconnect with the historical Jane: it suggests that the painful experience of this failed romance became a wellspring for Austen’s prodigious insight and creativity. To object to such things, however, is to ask too much of the biopic genre: we know the history must be squeezed and snipped to fit a filmic arc and keep us entertained. Becoming Jane manages this quite admirably.

Verdict: An enjoyable, above-average romcom. Who wouldn’t want to spend a couple of hours with Hathaway and McAvoy in pretty costumes?

The Departed wins Best Picture

What the?

Did I get this so wrong? Or is it finally the sympathy win, perhaps? Still no such luck for Kevin O'Connell.