Bright Star

I just had the pleasure of seeing Bright Star tonight. I was hoping it would be as good as the trailer, and it was. The trailer is not misleading in this sense but a pretty good representation of the movie.

Most of the negative reviews I've read for this have something to do with how the film is "little" or "slow." Rarely, they comment that it's "melodramatic." Which it's NOT by any means. It is not mawkishly sentimental at all. It's not epic, it is small in a way, and there's never any seizing moment of action. That doesn't make it boring; it's engaging throughout.

This is different from any period film I've ever seen, or really, imagined. It's not like typical period pieces in trying to wow you with its aesthetic recreation of the time, it's not so much about the visual splendor, though it looks very lovely and is thoroughly convincing as a representation of that period. It's visually quite different from other period pieces, it has a more realistic and kind of earthy look rather than pastel-colored and with a glow around everything. There are slums and less-than-palatial places. This isn't Pride and Prejudice. Neither does it have sort of a broad, sweeping narrative. At heart it's a deep love story about famed poet John Keats and his love and muse, Franny Brawne, whose relationship was cut short by a tragic death. It delves deeply into the small details of their courtship, and is pretty involved psychologically.

These people are portrayed realistically. Even the more minor characters, they all seem to be real people, with actual personalities, rather than caricatures or types of stuffy Regency people who are preoccupied with propriety and good marriage matches. Fanny's mother is nice, the main issue with her marrying Keats is that he literally can't support her, and the people they know aren't mindlessly concerned about it. They actually have FUN and do more interesting things than stand at ballroom dances and sit at dinner. Who would have thought people in a Regency period movie could actually climb trees, walk in the mud, or do quirky, whimsical things? Their ease and naturalness and relative candor in moving around, interacting with, and talking to each other was refreshing and definitely different from the idea you generally get. And this is the first period piece I've ever, ever seen where anyone has actually picked up and held their pet cat and treated it like you would your pet. You can actually hear it purring, it's a real part of their surroundings. I liked that cat, it was cute.

The dialogue was superb. It wasn't this sloppy, general, or comical/absurd stuff. It was precise, clear, charged with personality, and often beautiful. When you hear the conversations between Fanny and John, it's brilliant, real, and a pleasure. I have never seen such intelligence, subtlety, or elegance in a movie in this way. To hear Fanny respond to something John said, even just a word, as if she were actually thinking about it, as would happen in real life, as if she were an intelligent, feeling, witty person, was so nice. And so DIFFERENT. It's a little hard to explain if you haven't seen it. Suffice it to say, the dialogue is delicate and nuanced. They are articulate but not pretentious, they are sensitive, individual people - not unreal types who don't pick up on details. And it being about Keats, the characters have a lot of literary intelligence. You will enjoy the poetry in the movie.

The acting was great. Keats - I would probably fall in love with him, too. He seems like such a sensitive, romantic, and intelligent guy. Ben Whishaw was perfect for him. And Abbie Cornish as Fanny is wonderful - while not extravagantly gorgeous exactly, her face has such clear features that she has an extraordinary appeal. She is a very striking character, and deeply feeling about Keats. You get a real sense of love, real responses to grief instead of just a pretty swoon. It was a real romance - their tender kiss was beautiful, the things they said to each other, and the things they felt.

This movie is one of those rare films that are almost perfect to me. That doesn't make it my favorite movie, but it means I didn't find much wrong with it. The emotion isn't overwhelming, it's not exactly visceral, but it's moving and penetrating, it has its own style. It's NOT sappy or conventional. The extreme intelligence, realism, and emotional depth of this movie truly set it apart from all others. I heard a review say something like about how it's just about "old British speech and mannerisms," which couldn't be farther from the truth. It is NOT driven by quaintness or generic period speech like other period films. The dialogue is not stiff, pretentious, or artificial, though it's accurate. Sweet, moving, and intelligent, Bright Star has rare depth. It's definitely like no other movie. You should go see it if you think you'd be into it at all, by any stretch. You might not like it - it is rather "slow," but very interesting, at least for me - but it would be a thick or insensitive person indeed who couldn't appreciate it in some way. It's like how Keats described Fanny - "the brightest, most delicate thing."

My favorite quotes are:

"A thing of beauty is a joy forever. Its loveliness increases. It will never pass into nothingness."

"I almost wish we were butterflies, and lived but three summer days. Three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty common years could ever contain."

There are many others, much of Keats' letters to Fanny is so beautiful, but I can't remember them off the top of my head. These are two that appear in the trailer.

"Bright Star" is not only one of the best films of the year, but also Jane Campion's return to top form. Possibly the most acclaimed female director of her time, thanks to early strong and praised works such as "Sweetie" (1989), "An Angel At My Table" (1990) and particularly "The Piano" (1993), the truth is that Campion hasn't had a real critical or commercial success since... "The Piano". "The Portrait of a Lady" (1996), her adaptation of the Henry James novel, had a stellar cast, but was almost universally ignored; "Holy Smoke!" (1999), with Kate Winslet and Harvey Keitel, had its moments, but failed to impress anybody; and "In the Cut" (2003) was easily her worst film (but far from a disaster). The fact that Campion managed to remain such a respected name all these years even though not being the most prolific or successful filmmaker proves how influential and fascinating she is. She became some sort of figure for all the major female filmmakers from the past two decades and developed a very personal style marked by strong female sexuality (often, repressed), told with visual lyricism. She may be considered a feminist, but not the obviously preachy type, because her work flows like good cinema, and not as a heavy-handed gender discussion.

"Bright Star" is a tragic love story, beautifully directed, acted, photographed and written. Is it a revolutionary or innovative film? No. But the power of its lyricism and unabridged romanticism is infinitely touching. Anyone familiar with 19th century poet John Keats knows that he died of tuberculosis at 25 (and this is no major spoiler, since it's mentioned in every synopsis of the film), so we know the love birds are not going to live happily ever after. Campion centers on the three-year romance between Keats (a discreet and charming Ben Whishaw) and Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish, magnificent); their passion and the issues that prevented them from being together. Whishaw fits Keats' shoes perfectly, even if he might seem a little too low key at times. Paul Schneider ("All the Real Girls"), who's becoming one of the great American character actors, plays the villain as Charles Armitage Brown, Keats' friend who will do whatever he can to keep him away from Fanny. Kerry Fox ("Shallow Grave", "Intimacy"), unforgettable as Janet Frame in Campion's "An Angel At My Table", plays Mrs. Brawne, and Edie Martin is simply adorable as Fanny's little sister Toots. But this is Abbie Cornish's show all the way. This 27 year-old Australian first impressed me opposite Heath Ledger in 2006's "Candy", and here she shows her full potential. Her Fanny is simply incandescent - a terrific performance that could culminate in Oscar glory. For all romantics and admirers of good cinema, "Bright Star" is what Keats himself would call 'a thing of beauty... a joy forever' - intoxicatingly beautiful. 10/10.

I saw this film tonight, and in my eyes, it is a perfect film. Beautifully acted by all involved, (several times during the film I found myself thinking 'Abby Cornish is amazing!", despite not being a huge fan before), and stunningly shot, it contains some of the most beautifully cinematic scenes i have ever seen committed to film. Campion does a wonderful job of communicating Fanny' emotional state through the composition, particularly in one scene where the wind is blowing the curtain in her bedroom. The light and colour are fresh and gorgeous and the costumes and design add to the overall piece without being distracting, which is just what you want from a period piece.

But in the end, it is above all a wonderful story, well told. A deeply romantic tale, the story of Fanny and Keats could easily have become a mawkish, overly sentimental piece. But through her wonderfully naturalistic dialogue, her use of humour and light touch, and her restrained story telling (she never lets a scene go on one line too long) Jane Campion has created a heart wrenching film which I cannot fault. The characters are real and fully rounded, you feel the joys and the pain with them, and where I think she really succeeds is by making their love affair extraordinary and yet at the same time deeply ordinary. It stirred up my own personal experiences of love and loss and you would have to have a heart of stone not to shed a tear at the end. Lovely lovely film, and what cinema should be all about.

Through brilliant, stunning visuals and intelligent, witty dialogue, Jane Campion's Bright Star celebrates the rapture of passionate love. Using many of the Romantic John Keats' own words--captured for posterity in his poems and love letters to Fanny Brawne, his 'sweet Girl'--Campion has weaved together one of the most beautiful films I have ever seen.

Rich 19th-century fabrics and breathtaking English scenery make Bright Star a sensuous pleasure to experience. But these visuals merely reflect the beauty within, the soul of this film: the love affair of Miss Brawne and Mister Keats.

Brawne is passionate about and proud of her fashionable and daring needlework, as is Keats his aspiring albeit more fine-spun poetry, and both share an ardent love of life and a longing for someone with whom to experience it completely. Theirs is the inspiring true story of the rare uniting of equals--of two strong, independent, and intelligent individuals with unique talents and dreams yet deeply matching values and desires.

The emotional, intellectual, and subtly sensual affair between Brawne and Keats is captured wonderfully in Bright Star, owing in part to the portrayal and backdrop of those closest to the lovers in their own lives, such as Keats' coarse but caring friend Charles Brown and Brawne's warm mother and endearing siblings. The obtrusively vulgar Brown serves in stark contrast to the gentlemanly Keats, whose integrity and will Brown deeply admires but cannot quite live up to in his own life, while Brawne's loving family--woven seamlessly into the storyline through their presence in scenes of playfully benevolent games, strolls, and dinner-parties-- serves as foil to the equally loving yet singularly feisty Brawne. Through the meaningful and often-tender dialogue and interactions between these vivid characters, Bright Star is able to match beauty of setting with that of soul, a rare feat in a film...as it is in life.

Now Bright Star has been attacked as sentimental by the modern, cynical skeptic, and if it were the hackneyed story of a princess and a pauper mindlessly frolicking to their "fairytale" ending, his criticism might merit a modicum of respect. But Bright Star is not a fairytale in that empty sense; for the fact is Keats died at the age of 25, and he and Brawne were anything but mindless. So unhappily for the cynic, his venom is ineffectual against this film; for in Bright Star, his normally insidious strain of attack finds its antidote: reality. Bright Star is a *true story* depicting the love affair of two exceptional souls who lived a life (however brief for Keats) of happiness *in this world*. In today's angst-ridden, often gloomy atmosphere of humility and despair--where so many either consciously diffuse or unwittingly (and tragically) breathe in the modern liberal claim of man's depravity (itself merely a mutation of the ancient Christian notion of Original Sin)--the little-known Bright Star shines through in rebellion with pride and exaltation, demanding its viewers resurrect the self-esteem and aspiration they once had as children, and should never have let die as adults.

Although Bright Star is deeply uplifting and truly benevolent, one must be prepared to leave its resplendent world tinged with a real sadness. But this sadness does not--it cannot-- abide if one recalls Keats' own poetic words to Brawne (from an early love letter), which encapsulate the film's essence: passionate love for this wondrous world and one's 'Bright Star' in it...

"...I almost wish we were butterflies and liv'd but three summer days--three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty common years could ever contain."

I got the DVD of Bright Star as a get well present while recovering in hospital from a major spinal operation recently. Looking at the cover, it looked like my kind of movie, a romance and a period drama. Last Sunday, I watched it and was very impressed overall. It is a beautiful movie and competently directed and acted, but two things stop it from shining more than it could have done.

One is some of the dialogue. Not all mind, most of it is wonderfully poetic and moving, but then there is some of the more abstract language that feels more stilted and not as feasible to understand. My main problem is the pace, which throughout is rather slow making one or two scenes in the middle act a tad dull.

However, as a depiction of the joy of first love and the heart break that succeeds it, Bright Star is very effective. The final twenty minutes are heart-breaking, and the mood of the film compliments Keat's sensuous style beautifully. Jane Campion directs very competently, with each scene and season moving pretty much seamlessly to the next.

Bright Star has a beautiful, moving story, beautifully told and tells the story of Keats, his love and his beautiful poetry lovingly. The film looks exquisite, with lovely photography and authentic costumes and the painterly, watercolour-like scenery is spellbinding. The music adds to the poignancy, the background scoring is effective without overpowering and I liked the use of the Mozart piece if not the arrangement and how it was performed, some of the singing lacked support and the piece works much more as a chamber work.

The acting is fine and appropriately understated. Ben Whishaw is dashing and compellingly misty-eyed, while Paul Schneider adds a slight touch of menace and perhaps even realism to the picture. It was Abbie Cornish though who gave the best performance, one minute she is appropriately stern, another minute she is very poignant.

All in all, a lovely movie, could have been more, but one movie I would see again willingly. 7.5/10 Bethany Cox