nny | (no subject) (Reply)

I was left with a profound sense of 'meh', after that film. To be entirely concise, here's how I summed it up to Smaller:

"It's got all the dramatic music and it's like mwaha STUFF and LALALAA and I was like yeah yeah, get Paul naked again."

That's not really fair. There was Ian McKellan, too. And Alfred Molina and Jean Reno are always fun. It's just... it was a dull book, and it makes a dull film. It is essentially exposition with periods of exercise. Tom Hanks was utterly dull throughout, and I was so enormously grateful that a fatuous love story wasn't added to please studio executives, as was apparently wanted. Frankly Audrey Tautou had a lot more chemistry with Paul than with Tom (frankly, who wouldn't?) and any attempt at magnifying that would have been somewhat grotesque.

The whole feel of the film was a little cramped, a little too rushed for time; stuff was happening every moment and not much of it interested me at all.

Ian McKellan was delightful, absolutely and totally. His geek squee over the cryptex was adorable, his defensiveness of Mary Magdalene (poor dear) was charming, and he (as ever) played the fanatic very well indeed. He does noble causes fabulously. I fell in love with his dressing gown, the spiral staircase in his kitchen, and I think the whole film would have been infinitely better if instead of a plane he'd had a dirigible.

Paul was... I'm very grateful to Paul Bettany. Not only is he exceedingly tasty, he's also a very fine actor. He manages to make me look ever so slightly less shallow by being good at what he does and by often choosing very good projects. This? Not the best film he's been in, but damn was he excellent in it. Obviously, the line "you are an angel" made me giggle, and the way he said "you will be hunted by angels" and the way he looked as he said it... Yes. I liked. I also have something of a thing, discovered when watching The Reckoning, for Paul Bettany speaking Latin. Mmhmm. I also liked the way he wore the cilice. He never forgot that he was wearing it - he limped as he walked, yes, but even standing still there was a slope to his shoulders, favouring the side on which he wore it. A cross he chose to bear, I guess.

Okay, yes, I was totally paying more attention to what Paul was doing than to the rest of the film. It's because I'd already read the book and disliked it intensely. And not because it's cool to hate it, no; I dislike it because it's poorly written and it was a struggle to finish it. And the film... I don't know if people who liked the book would like the film. You'd have to ask someone who did. Either. It didn't come anywhere near A Beautiful Mind, which had the same director, screenwriter and (I think) producers. It was just a film that I'd happily go without seeing again.

Provided the scenes with Paul were thoroughly screencapped. ¬_¬

Oh, and my cinema-fu is the best. I not only managed to spill water (one of those sports cap bottles, you know how hard they are, right?) right down my cleavage, but I also almost lost a malteser down there.

*cool*