Adapting novels to the screen is always tricky business. What do you cut? What do you leave in? How do you portray in vision what the writer can take pages to describe in words, freezing time as they focus on the tiniest little detail?
Then again, adapting a novel where the overriding theme relates to another sense, smell, is always going to be even trickier. How on earth do you portray smell? Heighten colours? Really hammer home the production design? Introduce smell-o-vision into hundreds or thousands of screens?
Tom Tykwer (who did the fabulous Run, Lola, Run) decided to tackle the Patrick Süskind's book Perfume (co-writing and directing), where the main character is primarily notable for his incredible sense of smell and his desire to create the one greatest perfume. It is an admirable attempt. I liked the book when I read it a few years ago, I really felt that I could smell what the lead character (Jean-Baptiste Grenouille) was smelling, seeing, feeling. It was beautifully written to really wrap you up in the odours of the environment surrounding him.
Kudos to Tykwer, but it didn't really happen. And I think the biggest problem is that inability to truly affect any senses other than the optical and aural. You can't portray smell, and without the descriptions of the smells and what they are doing to Grenouille you just can't really get absorbed in his story. Ben Whishaw plays Grenouille admirably, really doing everything he can to put into his face, his voice, his actions everything Süskind had hours to do on paper. Intellectually, I think you can, in a respect, understand what Grenouille is going through, but it doesn't hit home emotionally because you just. Can't. Smell. Film. You can't. And that was always going to be the failing.
Look, it looked good, it sounded good, the performances were pretty good (and whilst I did just praise Whishaw, I felt his performance sometimes hammed up and caricatured a little - but then again, maybe if you could have smelt him it wouldn't have been necessary), but it just didn't feel. It didn't feel.
I do, however, respect the valiant effort. I think they did as well as anyone really could have done. But I also think maybe nobody should have tried. You can make a film about how, say, the touch of velvet against the skin can drive someone crazy, because we all pretty much know what velvet feels like. Even if it doesn't drive you crazy, you at least have a launching point. When Grenouille talks about the smell of glass, however, no one out there can touch it (no pun intended.) Glass? Smell? Nope. Hits nothing inside me. Sorry.
Having said that, I was never bored, but I also think that may be because I might be developing a crush on Whishaw (who I saw only a couple of weeks ago in Bright Star.) It wasn't that bad. It just wasn't that good.
Points for trying. 2.5 stars.
Showing posts with label Ben Whishaw. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ben Whishaw. Show all posts
Sunday, 29 November 2009
Tuesday, 10 November 2009
Bright Star Again
I was reading over at In Contention about how some reviewers have been singling out Paul Schneider for his supporting work in Bright Star, and I realised I had completely missed discussing his work in my write up yesterday.
I think his performance was good, playing the best friend of Keats who supports him through so much and then lets him down right at the end, if not a little histrionic. Whilst his temperament for the most part reflected and heightened the mischievousness aspects of Whishaw's performance, there were a few moments that did leave me wondering if he weren't overdoing it.
Basically, if we're discussing it on the basis of his hope for an Oscar nod (which is what In Contention is all about) then I think he will only pull through if the rest of the film pulls through in a fairly big way (I'm talking film, director, everything.) He needs to ride groundswell, and I just don't feel there is enough there behind the film to carry him through.
Meanwhile, hopefully today I'm going to see An Education. Here's hoping.
I think his performance was good, playing the best friend of Keats who supports him through so much and then lets him down right at the end, if not a little histrionic. Whilst his temperament for the most part reflected and heightened the mischievousness aspects of Whishaw's performance, there were a few moments that did leave me wondering if he weren't overdoing it.
Basically, if we're discussing it on the basis of his hope for an Oscar nod (which is what In Contention is all about) then I think he will only pull through if the rest of the film pulls through in a fairly big way (I'm talking film, director, everything.) He needs to ride groundswell, and I just don't feel there is enough there behind the film to carry him through.
Meanwhile, hopefully today I'm going to see An Education. Here's hoping.
Monday, 9 November 2009
Bright Star
So, I was going to go and see An Education this evening, but was distracted and missed it, and took myself instead to see Bright Star. I wasn't entirely convinced this would be a good idea - I was quite tired and I thought a period drama, no matter how good, may have put me to sleep. I was proven wrong, however.
Jane Campion's latest, her first feature since 2003's In The Cut, bore some semblance in the striking cinematography from Greig Fraser, a relative newcomer of considerable talent (this is only his third feature after The Caterpillar Wish, where I first noticed him, and Out of the Blue, both 2006 titles.) While his lensing has strong similarities to that of the similarly exceptional Dion Beebe (and I shall note that they are both from Down Under) in its use of focus, his work on this film is simply stunning, letting the design, story and acting speak for itself when it needs to, but adding a certain beauty to lift all elements beyond their own individual merit and into something particularly stunning. His work in this film deserves to be noted - as always, from his shorts (which I'm more familiar with), he tends to make me wet in places one shouldn't talk about publicly.
Abbie Cornish is someone I've always found to be a strange one. Something about her eyes makes me not trust her, and there were a number of points in the film where this rang true. She does, however, shine and shine strongly in many points throughout the story, which is indeed one of simplicity, beauty and tragedy, something you might expect. It is the story, ostensibly, of Cornish's character Fanny Brawne, and her relationship with the young John Keats in the lead up to his untimely death at the age of 25, a period when he was writing to no acclaim or fortune, despite the esteem in which he is held now. Of course, love conquers his poverty and all social obstacles standing in the way (including the rubber-armed Kerry Fox as Fanny's very abiding mother, a good performance though I was not entirely enamoured with her accent.) Their love cannot, however, conquer the illness that eventually proves Keats' downfall.
Whishaw's portrayal, which is not really being spoken of, is one that I found quite disarming, not to mention surprising. He brought a graceful levity to the intensity of the poet with quite simple movements and actions - a cheeky, flirty glance up here, a simple fleeting smile there. His humour resonated and lifted the entire film, without it ever feeling like he was trying to bring down the stakes that propelled the story. Fun-loving, loyal, but ultimately a romantic, Keats' poetry felt entirely real and natural coming out of his mouth. While I understand that my reservations about Cornish may be mine alone, and are not limited to this film, Whishaw, for me, was the brightest star (oh yes I did.) Though it should be noted that the two did play off each other perfectly - while I feel he was the character I was more drawn to, he never overplayed Cornish, and I can't imagine the one without the other.
While these elements, with the total design of the piece, were generally perfect, I did struggle with some aspects of the handling of the narrative, with some of the beats in the film and general direction. There were occasional jarring transitions, and moments that I think could have been handled better. So it was definitely not Campion's best work (her oeuvre includes The Piano, after all), but all in all a fine film. The final scene was understatedly powerful, and Keats' words over the closing credits kept everyone in their seats, and I must say that I feel it is worth the film if only for that, though there is a lot more to find in the two hours preceding.
Jane Campion's latest, her first feature since 2003's In The Cut, bore some semblance in the striking cinematography from Greig Fraser, a relative newcomer of considerable talent (this is only his third feature after The Caterpillar Wish, where I first noticed him, and Out of the Blue, both 2006 titles.) While his lensing has strong similarities to that of the similarly exceptional Dion Beebe (and I shall note that they are both from Down Under) in its use of focus, his work on this film is simply stunning, letting the design, story and acting speak for itself when it needs to, but adding a certain beauty to lift all elements beyond their own individual merit and into something particularly stunning. His work in this film deserves to be noted - as always, from his shorts (which I'm more familiar with), he tends to make me wet in places one shouldn't talk about publicly.
Abbie Cornish is someone I've always found to be a strange one. Something about her eyes makes me not trust her, and there were a number of points in the film where this rang true. She does, however, shine and shine strongly in many points throughout the story, which is indeed one of simplicity, beauty and tragedy, something you might expect. It is the story, ostensibly, of Cornish's character Fanny Brawne, and her relationship with the young John Keats in the lead up to his untimely death at the age of 25, a period when he was writing to no acclaim or fortune, despite the esteem in which he is held now. Of course, love conquers his poverty and all social obstacles standing in the way (including the rubber-armed Kerry Fox as Fanny's very abiding mother, a good performance though I was not entirely enamoured with her accent.) Their love cannot, however, conquer the illness that eventually proves Keats' downfall.
Whishaw's portrayal, which is not really being spoken of, is one that I found quite disarming, not to mention surprising. He brought a graceful levity to the intensity of the poet with quite simple movements and actions - a cheeky, flirty glance up here, a simple fleeting smile there. His humour resonated and lifted the entire film, without it ever feeling like he was trying to bring down the stakes that propelled the story. Fun-loving, loyal, but ultimately a romantic, Keats' poetry felt entirely real and natural coming out of his mouth. While I understand that my reservations about Cornish may be mine alone, and are not limited to this film, Whishaw, for me, was the brightest star (oh yes I did.) Though it should be noted that the two did play off each other perfectly - while I feel he was the character I was more drawn to, he never overplayed Cornish, and I can't imagine the one without the other.
While these elements, with the total design of the piece, were generally perfect, I did struggle with some aspects of the handling of the narrative, with some of the beats in the film and general direction. There were occasional jarring transitions, and moments that I think could have been handled better. So it was definitely not Campion's best work (her oeuvre includes The Piano, after all), but all in all a fine film. The final scene was understatedly powerful, and Keats' words over the closing credits kept everyone in their seats, and I must say that I feel it is worth the film if only for that, though there is a lot more to find in the two hours preceding.
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