December 22: Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day (2008)

Adapted from a novel by Winifred Watson (what an alliterative name!) by screenwriters Simon Beaufoy (The Full Monty) and David Magee (Finding Neverland), Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day was a charming if fluffy way to pass the time.

Frances McDormand portrays Guinivere Pettigrew, a British governess in the 1930s who is a bit dour, very straight-laced and apparently unemployable. Despite repeated attempts to be placed by an agency, Miss Pettigrew gets the sack. The film's event unfold over the course of one day when everything changes. After losing her last gig and spending a night on the streets where she pretty much loses everything except for the clothes on her back, Pettigrew pilfers information about a possible employment opportunity and shows up at the door of flighty Delysia Lafosse (Amy Adams), a chorus girl with aspirations who is juggling a trio of lovers, including Phil (Tom Payne, handsome but shallow), the youngish producer who may be able to boost her to stardom, Nick (Mark Strong, debonair with a hint of cruelty), her sugar daddy who keeps her in apartments and fancy clothes, and Michael (Lee Pace, charming), a musician who knows the girl behind the dreamer she now has become.

The take-charge Pettigrew snaps to action. The one thing she can do well is size up a situation quickly and come up with plausible explanations. Along the way, she gets drawn into fixing another relatioship, that of Delysia's rival Edith (the always wonderful Shirley Henderson) and Joe (Ciaran Hinds, seemingly relieved at not portraying a heavy), her slightly older and gentler suitor.

On paper this is catnip and shortly after Watson's novel was published it was optioned for the movies to be a vehicle for Billie Burke as Miss Pettigrew. Personally I think that might have been a bit disatrous as Burke, like Alice Brady, tended to portray scatterbrains; she might have made a better Delysia. The project languished for nearly 70 years before it finally hit the screens and, frankly, McDormand is perfectly cast as the uptight governess/social secretary. Her Pettigrew is a masteful comic creation and she grounds the movie, becoming the placid center around which all the intrigue swirls. Adams is a bit chirpy and sacchrine at first but eventually she adjusts and plays her character in a less cartoon-like manner. As with many romantic comedies, it's painfully obvious which of her three suitors is more suitable just as the chemistry between McDormand and Hinds hints at an outcome that isn't too hard to predict.

Half the fun is getting there, though. The director, Bharat Nalluri (who helmed The Crow: Salvation), doesn't seem fully comfortable with the genre. The film lacks a certain panache. Still, the production design of Sarah Greenwood, the costumes of Michael O'Connor (who won an Oscar for The Duchess), and the cinematography of  John de Borman (who shot Ella Enchanted, among others) go a long way toward creating the appropriate atmosphere.

The actors appear to be having a good time and that infectiousness eventually overcomes whatever shortcomings the movie has. There are some slightly darker elements as well, and the hints of the war to come layer this particular 24-hour period with a certain poignance. While not exactly a complete throwback to the old-fashioned studio produced romantic comedies of the time depicted on screen, Miss Pettigew Lives for a Day comes pretty close. It's an enjoyable way to spend an hour and a half.

Rating:     B

December 13: A Little Night Music

In honor of the opening of the first Broadway revival of the Stephen Sondheim-Hugh Wheeler masterpiece -- which is one of my favorite musicals -- I pulled out my copy of this movie and watched it again.

The show is based on Ingmar Bergman's 1955 comedy Smiles of a Summer Night, which in turn owes something to Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Comedy in that both revolve around a series of mismatched lovers. Bergman's charming and droll film has been well served in Hugh Wheeler's adaptation. (As a side note, I feel a need to point out that Wheeler was one of the better musical book writers and his contributions to this play and to Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street are often overlooked in the same manner that Piave's contributions to Rigoletto and La traviata aren't always recognized. It's a composer's world, I guess.)

Only four scant years after the musical graced Broadway, Harold Prince had the notion to turn the stage show into a film. Unfortunately, it was a troubled production, despite the presence of a genuine movie star -- Elizabeth Taylor -- in the lead role. Financing proved difficult and there were starts and stops in filming. What ended up on screen is a pale imitation of the enjoyable stage musical.

It's always interested me that Prince could employ cinematic techniques when directing for the theater but put him behind a camera and he was at sea. His first effort, the Wheeler-penned film Something for Everyone, did not exactly inspire rave reviews. For A Little Night Music, the location was switched from Sweden to Vienna (because the score was written in 3/4 time?) which required renaming some of the characters. In the show, there is a group of leider singers who function as a chorus, but they are jettisoned, despite the film's first sequence that makes it appear the audience is watching a stage show. Somehow with the financial uncertainty, that aspect of the production got forgotten.


Instead, the audience gets a very turgid version of the original with almost all sense of the comedy lost. In a nutshell, lawyer Fredrick Egerman (Len Cariou) is married to his virginal second wife Anne (Lesley-Anne Down) who is the object of desire of his seminarian son Erich (Christopher Guard). Egerman decides to seek counsel from his ex-mistress Desiree (Elizabeth Taylor), a bohemian actress with a teenage daughter (Chloe Franks). She is also carrying on a relationship with a titled military man (Laurence Guittard) whose long-suffering wife (Diana Rigg) is acquainted with Egerman's wife Anne. All parties converge at the estate of Desiree's mother (Hermione Gingold) where the relationships get sorted out.

Cariou, Guittard and Gingold reprise their stage roles. None of the movie star names -- Down, Taylor and Rigg -- (who look gorgeous in Florence Klotz's Oscar-nominated costumes) are particularly noted for their singing abilities. Taylor tries mightily hard but doesn't capture the essence of the character. Her version of the show's best-known song "Send in the Clowns" is passable but hardly memorable. Gingold does what she can with her part but the best performance (in what is generally thought to be the best role) comes from Rigg.

That's feignt praise, though, as this film is nothing short of a disaster. Whether it was because of the monetary problems, Prince's lack of experience with film, bad casting decisions, or some combination of all, this version of A Little Night Music falls far short of the possibilities inherent in this musical. Hollywood has remake fever, yet they don't seem to want to take on terrible movies that cry out for a new version (like this one). Perhaps if the new revival proves to be a hit, then someone might take another crack at it.

Rating:      D+

December 10: The Duchess of Langeais

Several months ago I rented The Duchess of Langeais from Blockbuster (it was an exclusive to that outlet) and watched it. But I didn't write about it because at the time I wasn't making the time to write. I had health issues (a bad reaction to a prescribed medication), work was stressful and consuming, and while I enjoyed watching films, I really didn't feel like writing about them. I was burnt out after a decade on the job and need a bit of an extended vacation.

Well, the same film recently turned up on the Sundance Channel and I watched it again, because, frankly, I had enjoyed it a lot the first time. I also was particularly drawn to the film because of its French title Ne touchez pas la hache, or as it was known in the United Kingdom, Don't Touch the Axe.

Adapted from a Balzac novella by Pascal Bonitzer, Christine Laurent and director Jacques Rivette, The Duchess of Langeais opens with General Armand de Montriveau (the late Guillaume Depardieu in dashing mode), a military veteran of the Napoleonic wars, who makes a pilgrimage to a convent in Spain in order to speak with a Carmelite nun known as Sister Theresa (Jeanne Balibar, who also starred in the director's Va Savoir). After the interview, Theresa announces that she has lied to the Mother Superior -- the military office was not a relative but her lover -- and then the story flashes back several years.

Five years earlier, the pair had first met in Paris. At the time, she was Antoinette de Langeais and he was a celebrated military figure who had been wounded in battle in Africa. They share an immediate attraction, but societal pressures cause her to only play the coquette. Frustrated, Armand resorts to kidnapping the duchess and threatening her. But she continues to refuse to surrender herself entirely to him. He pulls away and she then recognizes how much she loves him. There's a failed rendez-vous that leads them to the Spanish convent and the film's tragic denouement.

The Duchess of Langeais falls nicely in with much of Rivette's work, embracing themes of enslavement and escape. The movie's logline could read something along the lines of Beauty and the Beast meets Les Liaisons Dangereuses. There's romance but the relationship takes on a decidedly martial tone. Antoinette enjoys being a flirt and a tease, but she pushes too far and Armand resorts to what he knows best, battlefield strategy. She becomes an object to defeat in order to possess and that leads to the multi-year separation which in turn leads to tragedy.

The cast is superb with Balibar appropriately mercurial and sensual while Depardieu delivers a memorable performance as the man who lashes out at that which he cannot have. There's also strong support by veteran actors Bulle Ogier and Michel Piccoli (the co-stars of Belle Toujours) who proffer advice to the duchess on how to handle her affairs.

Watching the film now, though, there is a poignance to Depardieu's work. He had lost a leg to an infection following a motorcycle accident, so he employs that in his characterization of this wounded general. Now, following his surprising death from pneumonia, watching his work invokes the same sort of feelings that seeing any performer gone too soon (e.g., James Dean, Heath Ledger), the prospect of what might have been. For many years, Depardieu acted in the shadow of his famous father, but along the way, he came into his own and was establishing himself as a strong screen presence. This film is one that serves as a testament to his abilities. Rent it or seek it out on Sundance.

Rating: A-

Dec. 3 "Approaching Union Square"

Recently, I upgraded my cable to include High Definition, so I now have a DVR -- which for me can be a dangerous thing. I've already loaded up on the occasional TV show (Hello! "Glee" and "FlashForward"), and have recorded several films that were scheduled during the hours I need to sleep. Over the last two years -- since I started with cable again -- I have been frustrated because occasionally a film I would like to watch appears on the channel's schedule ONCE -- one time -- and usually at the strange hour of 2am or so. (What that says about the films I want to watch is another story.)

So, recently I set the DVR for a small film that was playing on the Sundance Channel called Approaching Union Square. I selected this little indie for a couple of reasons. I used to live near and work in the Union Square area and I've been very nostalgic for Manhattan recently. And then there was the small matter that I was acquainted with one of the actors. So with a running time of 80 minutes, I figured what did I have to lose?

Without knowing much about the film, I settled in to watch and almost immediately I had the feeling that it was based on a play. There was something very theatrical in the set-up and the first scene is a woman (Katie Kreisler) talking to her therapist which culminates in the revelation that she thinks she's psychic. She soon boards a bus on which there are 9 other passengers and as the camera pans, it settles on one and there's a flashback to a recent event in their lives. Each rider has a moment but overall the only thing the characters have in common is that they are all on the same bus.

As it turns out, the film, which marked the feature directing and writing debut of Marc Meyers, was based on Meyers' stage play Love & Sex: Tales From the Trenches, which consisted of 11 monologues.

So once I "got" the film's set-up, I settled back and tried to appreciate the film. Overall, the acting was adequate with a couple of stand outs. The best known actor in the film would be Christine Elise (McCarthy), who played the recurring role of Jason Priestley's girlfriend on the old "Beverly Hills, 90210" series. Here she's cast as a woman seeking love and engaging in a long-distance flirtation. She does a nice job with an underwritten role. Others who stood out were Kreisler (perhaps because hers was the first and eventually the one that does ties the others together); Darren Pettie as a smug sex addict; Brent Crawford discussing an ex-girlfriend who is now ill; Victoria Haas as a cheating spouse breaking things off with her lover; and Patricia Randell as a woman afraid of many things.

Meyers is a better director than he is a writer -- personally I found several of the vignettes underdeveloped and undramatic. What may work on stage in a theater doesn't always translate well to the big screen -- and that is the case with several of the monologues. Meyers' staging and use of the camera, though, were assured and did not betray his status as a novice.

I got to see the actor with whom I was acquainted (and for several reasons I choose not to identify him/her) but there was hardly any shots of the streets of New York. The bus riders could have been approaching the Upper East Side or Central Park or anywhere in Manhattan (or even somewhere in one of the boroughs). For that, I was disappointed. Overall, the movie itself was intriguing and several of the scenes were enough to whet the appetite, unfortunately, as a whole, they weren't a filling meal.

Rating: C