Cate walks away with it


With the exception of Orlando I haven't been a fan of Sally Potter's films and this is no exception. This film was very clumsily made - badly directed, badly written and very badly acted. Taturro was completely miscast as the Opera singer and utterly unconvincing, Christina Ricci proves that she simply can not act. She was completely wooden and monotonous on screen. There was no depth or any layers to her performance whatsoever and the scene where she starts crying on the bed was cringeworthy. She was fine as the go-to girl for quirky child actors, but as an adult, she is simply not strong enough of an actress to carry an entire film. Johnny Depp essentially played Johnny Depp - but that's more to do with a lacklustre script which gave him a one-dimensional character and little to do besides looking good.

The only exception to all this Cate Blanchett who utterly steals the film and elevates it as best she can. The way she manages to give such depth to an ostensibly superficial character is astonishing. She made us see what was driving this woman to escape her surroundings and made us wonder about what horrors lay behind the 'smiles and makeup.'

She strongly resembles Meryl Streep here in Sophies Choice - the nature of the characters hidden past, the accent, her appearance and of her course her style of acting style clearly very influenced by Meryl's work. But unlike Meryl, Cate doesn't have Sophies Choice material to work with and the fact that she still gives a great performance in bad film is remarkable.

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With the exception of Orlando I haven't been a fan of Sally Potter's films and this is no exception. This film was very clumsily made - badly directed, badly written and very badly acted. Taturro was completely miscast as the Opera singer and utterly unconvincing, Christina Ricci proves that she simply can not act. She was completely wooden and monotonous on screen. There was no depth or any layers to her performance whatsoever and the scene where she starts crying on the bed was cringeworthy. She was fine as the go-to girl for quirky child actors, but as an adult, she is simply not strong enough of an actress to carry an entire film. Johnny Depp essentially played Johnny Depp - but that's more to do with a lacklustre script which gave him a one-dimensional character and little to do besides looking good.


Totally disagree.

The only exception to all this Cate Blanchett who utterly steals the film and elevates it as best she can. The way she manages to give such depth to an ostensibly superficial character is astonishing. She made us see what was driving this woman to escape her surroundings and made us wonder about what horrors lay behind the 'smiles and makeup.'


Totally agree. She's not called Cate the Great for nothing.

I wish you were the one
Wish you were the one that got away...


-The Civil Wars

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