Movie Review Nine

Nine (2009) 

Directed by Rob Marshall

Written by Michael Tollin, Anthony Minghella 

Starring Daniel Day Lewis, Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz, Nicole Kidman, Kate Hudson

Release Date December 18th, 2009

Published December 17th, 2009 

The musical “Nine” starring Antonio Banderas is a middling attempt to bring Federico Fellini to the masses. Italy's legendary surrealist director has, since his turn to surrealism after successfully defining Italian cinema and culture in the 1950's, been a mystery to most. Creative types have always felt that they understood what the Italian master was after and Maury Yeston, who wrote the music for the Broadway production, was apparently one of those creative types; so much so that he felt the need to water down Fellini with tired song and dance and a three act structure.

Now, Yeston's watered down work becomes a slightly more sophisticated but still wrongheaded movie musical. Oscar winner Rob Marshall is the latest to see the need to explain Fellini's genius to the great unwashed and like Yeston, he is a fabulous failure.

The story of “Nine” surrounds Italian director Guido Contini (Daniel Day Lewis), our substitute Fellini,  who, pushed by his producer, is about to begin production of his latest film “Italia.” This is despite the fact that he hasn't written a word of the script. Guido has lost his inspiration and calls upon the many muses of his past to bring a story to mind.

These muses include his wife Luisa (Marion Cotillard), his mistress Carla (Penelope Cruz), his late mother (Sophia Loren), his long time star, Claudia (Nicole Kidman) and a sex worker (pop princess Fergie) who taught him and his friends a little of the birds and bees decades ago. Meanwhile, he seeks advice from his best friend and costume designer Lilli (Judi Dench) and a little ego stroke, among other things, from a journalist named Stephanie (Kate Hudson).

Each of these women offer Guido a song or two, belting out their inner monologues, mostly about what a genius he is, save Luisa who calls him out for the bastard philanderer he truly is. If you have always held the impression that directors are self involved egotists, these songs, this film, will do little to disabuse you of that notion.

“Nine” is a shambling disaster for most of its run time. We are informed from the first moment that Guido is a genius but he is never required to demonstrate any kind of genius. When Lewis gives him voice for the first time he might explain a little about Guido but it's hard to hear over the gales of laughter elicited when his Italian accented singing is compared, not so favorably, to Jason Segal's singing Dracula puppet in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.”

The rest of the cast is far stronger in singing with Cotillard, naturally, the stand-out. The actress who won an Academy Award for her portrayal of Edith Piaf in “La Vien Rose” proves once again to be a natural and charismatic singer. Meanwhile, Kate Hudson is the surprise of the singers. Hudson has the film's one original song, “Cinema Italiano,” and it is the one really lively moment in the film, if not the most coherent or necessary.

Rob Marshall dismisses narrative coherence for a series of Guido's masturbatory fantasies, interrupted from time to time by his wife and a little Catholic guilt. Every woman in the film is asked to bow to his brilliance and their bowing is treated as evidence of his genius. Yet, never once does Guido have to prove his brilliance. This might not be a problem if Daniel Day Lewis gave Guido any dimension beyond a tortured libido.

Speaking of tortured, for a movie about Fellini, whose fanciful work included clowns, strolling musicians and endless parades, “Nine” tends toward a dirge. From Day Lewis's tortured “Guido's Song” opener to the feature tune “Be Italian,” sung by Fergie, the songs of “Nine” are a slog. “Be Italian” sounded rather brilliant in the film's exceptional trailer but in the film it becomes not a celebration of Italian culture but a command from a taskmistress.

“Be Italian” is a major misstep from Director Marshall who fumbles not just the song, staged a little too much like something from his far better musical “Chicago,” but the back story. Fergie's sex worker character is a turning point in the life of Guido Contini, a moment that shaped the way he treated women the rest of his life. Yet, do we see Fergie getting sexy and giving young Guido a truly formative memory? No, instead we cut from Marshall’s lame staged song to scenes of Fergie cavorting with child Guido and pals like a slightly creepy babysitter.

What could have possessed anyone to want to bring a Fellini type to the big screen in such a conventional and old fashioned manner? It's typical of the arrogant audience to talk down to the masses but how is this spoon-feeding of Fellini supposed to entice anyone to want to see 8 1/2 or Satirycon or even Fellini's more conventional films such as La Strada or Nights of Cabiria? Trust me dear reader when I tell you that Nine will not be able to prepare you for the wondrous surrealist brilliance of Federico Fellini. Nor will it prepare you for his brilliant use of subtlety and sadness. 

Nine is like Fellini for Dummies minus any actually helpful information. On top of failing as a tribute to Fellini, Nine simply fails as a movie. Take the inspiration away and all that is left is this boorish, tin-eared mess of a movie made by people who think dumbing down art to the lowest common denominator is the only way to promote great art to the masses. How dreadful is that? 

Movie Review Cold Mountain

Cold Mountain (2003) 

Directed by Anthony Minghella 

Written by Anthony Minghella 

Starring Nicole Kidman, Renee Zellweger, Jude Law, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Natalie Portman 

Release Date December 25th, 2003 

Published December 24th, 2003 

In 1997, Author Charles Frazier set out to tell a story that had been passed through his family for years. It was the story of his great uncle H.P Inman and his arduous trek home to North Carolina after deserting the Southern army near the end of the Civil War. In translating the story to the page, Frazier created an epic love story combined it with a Homeric odyssey and bathed it in Southern gentility.

Now in the hands of Director Anthony Minghella, Cold Mountain is a portentous, pompous, epic scale film and a sure bet Best Picture candidate.

Jude Law stars as Inman, a day laborer helping to build a brand new chapel for the people of Cold Mountain who are welcoming the arrival of a new Minister, Reverend Monroe (Donald Sutherland). With Reverend Monroe is his daughter Ada (Nicole Kidman), a well-educated, Charlotte-bred woman who has never done a days work in her life. Ada is a trained pianist, a writer and lives to serve her father. The attraction between Ada and Inman is immediate though inexplicable. The timing couldn’t be worse as Inman is leaving to join the Southern army to fight in the Civil War. They exchange photographs and a single passionate kiss. They promise to write and Inman promises to come back.

At war, Inman is witness to one of the bloodiest battles of the war, the battle at Petersburg, Virginia. The battle is legendary for the massive mistake made by the northern army who, after setting off a huge explosion underneath the southern lines, charged ahead into the crater they created. Once trapped inside the remaining Southern soldiers are able to pick them off one by one as they attempted to climb out of the crater. Inman watches most of the carnage until forced to jump in and save a friend who fell into the crater.

Afterwards, Inman is injured in a raid meant to kill the remaining Northerners trapped in the crater. While recovering, he receives a letter from Ada detailing her struggles since he left and asking him to come home. Inman immediately deserts and begins a very long walk home.

In the meantime, Ada is in grave danger of her own. With all of the able bodied men of Cold Mountain off to war and her father having passed away, Ada is left to tend the farm which she can't do. With only the kindness of an old couple played by Kathy Baker and James Gammon is Ada able to survive. At the old couple’s urging Ada takes in a woman named Ruby (Renee Zellweger), a force of nature personality who's as spunky as Ada is helpless. Ruby moves in and teaches Ada how to survive.

Zellweger's Ruby is at once the film’s most interesting and most problematic performance. On the one hand, it brings the film some much-needed lightness to balance the dreariness of the austere landscape and doomed love story. On the other hand, Zellweger continues to draw laughs even as she is supposed to be drawing sympathy. Credit Renee Zellweger for her ability to keep Ruby from going over the top but the adapted screenplay does her little favor with it's cornpone wisdom and forced passages that play up the character’s lack of education. The role was initially intended for an African American actress, the change is a wise one because as written the role would have been clearly racist.

As Inman makes his trek back to Cold Mountain he also meets some colorful characters, including a lecherous priest played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman and a nasty little redneck played by Giovanni Ribisi. Then there is the odd cameo by Natalie Portman as a war widow trying to protect her sick infant and fend off the Union army creeping up on her doorstep. She takes in Inman during a heavy rainstorm and the two have an odd encounter that is chastely romantic but unnecessary. Portman's scenes drag out the runtime of the film and serve no purpose on Inman's journey other than showing what great chemistry Law and Portman could have together given more time.

Much has been said of the chemistry between Law and Kidman, including rumors of onset romance. However, in the film they share so few scenes that the chemistry is never really an issue. Ada and Inman don't fall in love with one another but rather the idea of each other. Inman headed off to war and the strong possibility of death and appears to grab on to the image of Ada, the most beautiful woman he has ever seen, as a reason to fight and a reason to keep living in the face of great tragedy. 

As for Ada, Inman is at first simply an intriguing romance but in the course of losing her father and suffering on the farm, before Ruby arrives to help her, Inman is a savior. Inman is a knight in shining armor coming to her rescue. It is the idea of one another that matters, not the person themselves. It’s that idea which makes the film’s ending all the more poetic and fascinating.

I'm not going to give away anything, Director Anthony Minghella certainly never gives anything away. For most of the entire nearly three hour runtime of Cold Mountain, the audience has a preconceived notion of what will happen and Minghella alternately delivers it and subverts it. Switching perspectives from Ada to Inman, shifting the timeline from when Inman and Ada met to the current moment of their journey. The film is at once conventional and out of sorts and I dig that about it.

That said there is another element of Cold Mountain that I didn't like. Call it the Miramax effect or maybe just something about Minghella's affected filmmaking, but everything about Cold Mountain screams out at you to appreciate it whether you want to or not. There is an arrogance to it that says the film doesn't have to be entertaining because it's above that. It's like an obnoxious person who simply assumes that you like them regardless of how you really feel. Cold Mountain seems full of itself and arrives with an air that says “Award me.”

Is Cold Mountain a well-crafted film? Absolutely. Is it among the best films of 2003? No. Does it demand that you think it is? Definitely.