Lackluster Love: Phantom Thread Blends Boredom And Beauty

The Good: Decent performances and cinematography
The Bad: Pacing, Dull characters, Virtually plotless, Flaccid characters
The Basics: P.T. Anderson disappoints with Phantom Thread.


In the ten days since I saw Phantom Thread, I have been trying to muster up the enthusiasm to write about the cinematic experience. I love the works of writer/director P.T. Anderson. Indeed, in my life full of experiences, one of my most enjoyable memories of an event I attended was a screening with Anderson at which I had a chance to stump the artist with an insightful question and meet him. Ever since Magnolia (reviewed here!), I have been a loyal devotee of P.T. Anderson's works. So, after weeks of trying to find a movie theater within 200 miles playing Anderson's latest, Phantom Thread, I was particularly excited when it was playing at a theater a block away from the hotel I was staying on my recent business trip. My first night on the road, I eagerly went to see Phantom Thread.

And, wow, was I disappointed.

Phantom Thread is no Magnolia. It's no Punch-Drunk Love (reviewed here!) even. The comparison between Punch-Drunk Love and Phantom Thread is an important one; Punch-Drunk Love featured two characters - one in deep emotional pain, the other who appears to be straitlaced and intensely normal - and the two develop an unlikely romantic relationship that builds to an important moment when the expectations about Emily Watson's character are suddenly and brilliantly subverted. Punch-Drunk Love is complicated, quirky, and artistically-delivered in a way that encourages rewatching. Phantom Thread is just boring. Phantom Thread lacks a spark of intrigue or chemistry between the two protagonists (whereas, in Punch-Drunk Love the important character aspect of the protagonist is clearly laid out - he is a man constantly betrayed who is looking for love and needs the security of someone who will not subvert his trust - and he has impressive chemistry with his romantic partner). Unlike something where there are two people who, on the surface, seem to have nothing in common developing a romance, Phantom Thread is plagued by two characters who have nothing in common, no chemistry, and no real interest in one another insisting that they are in a relationship of some sort (it never appears actually romantic).

Reynolds Woodcock is a fashion designer in London, where he runs an upscale boutique with his sister. His dresses are highly sought-after and he goes for breakfast at a little restaurant where Alma works. Woodcock asks Alma out (though it is phrased more as a demand) and he insists on bringing her back to his fashion house where he uses her as a mannequin to design a new dress. After a series of such moments where Woodcock uses Alma's body as a form for his new works, Alma starts to realize that she is not actually important to Woodcock. So, she poisons him so he will be helpless and is forced to rely upon her, but - of course - as soon as he gets better, he reverts to neglecting her.

And it's 2 hours and ten minutes of Daniel Day-Lewis acting stiff, focused, and unlikable. Day-Lewis is fine playing such an emotionally-distant and, on a moment's notice, angry character, but it seems like a truly weird note to end his acting career on. In a similar way, Vicky Krieps plays Alma well as a woman who is subtly begging for affection - though she is not given enough of a role to sufficiently explain why Alma accepts Woodcock from the beginning to make her character at all compelling. And Lesley Manville makes Cyril weird and authoritative through her performance . . . though the character is not particularly interesting.

P.T. Anderson directs Phantom Thread beautifully, but that does not make the story any more compelling, less boring or worth writing more about.

2.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2018 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Lonely And Appropriately Epic, There Will Be Blood Is Engaging, But Lacking Spark.

The Good: Acting, Pacing, Most of the plotting
The Bad: No pop, Unlikable characters or characters we fail to empathize with.
The Basics: There Will Be Blood illustrates that P.T. Anderson can deliver an adapted screenplay that makes amazing use of the screen, but the film still lacks some of the zest and originality of his other films.


Shortly after my wife and I moved into our new apartment last year, P.T. Anderson released a new film. I was excited; I have generally loved his works, especially Magnolia (reviewed here!) and I was eager to see his latest film. So, for my birthday, my wife treated me to a trip downstate to the nearest theater we could find that was playing The Master (reviewed here!) and, unfortunately, it was a tremendous waste of time, money, and enthusiasm. Prior to that trip, I had picked up the two-disc version of Anderson’s prior film, There Will Be Blood, but after The Master, it was hard to convince my wife to crack the case open and let us watch it. Now, over a year later, she was in the mood for something different and I had let the sting of Anderson’s lone cinematic failure fade, so I figured it was a good time to put in There Will Be Blood.

There Will Be Blood is almost everything that it is hyped to be: it looks beautiful, the acting is incredible, and the themes in the story are smart and sweeping. But watching the film, I found myself waiting. I was waiting for the movie to pop, I was waiting for the intellectual engagement to click and for the movie to become something I was actually enjoying. Anderson’s first work, Hard Eight (reviewed here!) features characters that one is almost instantly able to empathize with as they haplessly stumble about trying to do the right thing and in Punch-Drunk Love (reviewed here!), Anderson managed to make Adam Sandler’s character into an utterly heartbreaking figure who is betrayed by everyone he trusts in such wrenching ways that it is virtually impossible to look away. After a five minute opening sequence without a single line, Anderson adequately sets the mood for There Will Be Blood, but the movie never evolves into anything more than a history lesson of sorts. The two principle characters have a battle of wills and their motivations are clear for the most part, but they lack either an epic significance or a deeply personal humanity that Anderson’s characters usually possess. As a result, There Will Be Blood is essentially two titanic egos facing off.

Starting in 1898, in California, Daniel Plainview is an oil prospector who suffers an accident in one of his mines while searching for oil, breaking his leg. Years later, having successfully struck oil, he is running a rig when one of the workers is killed by a piece of falling equipment. Daniel takes H.W. as his own son and uses him as a prop when selling the family nature of his drilling business as he heads west. Eager to buy up land to grow his business, Daniel, his assistant Fletcher, and H.W. hear out a prospect from Paul Sunday, a young man who believes there is oil on his family farm. Arriving at the Sunday farm, Daniel and H.W. find a young man who looks identical to Paul, who seems resistant to having the oil company lease the land. Working out an arrangement where Daniel will help fund Eli Sunday’s church and help sway some of the local landowners to lease land for the oil company to drill on, Daniel and his son begin to change the landscape of the otherwise barren township.

Over the years, the tensions between Eli and Daniel rise. Daniel snubs Eli when it comes to opening the well (Eli wanting to perform a public blessing on the rig) and when Daniel’s plan to make an oil pipeline to the Pacific forces him to negotiate with a holdout in Eli’s parish, Eli manipulates Daniel into getting baptized at his church. Daniel’s life spirals into rage and drunkenness when H.W. is wounded during a rig explosion. Sending H.W. away leads to resentment, tension, and an ultimate conflict that leaves Daniel alone with only his spite and massive oil interests.

Daniel Plainview is played by Daniel Day-Lewis and the performance is so masterful that one would never guess that he’s a Brit from the role. Day-Lewis carries his character’s limp through the entire film and speaks in a slower, lower drawl than in his other roles, clearly distinguishing Plainview from anyone else he has ever played.

The rest of the performances are equally impressive. Paul Dano is so good as Paul and Eli that, until the ultimate revelation that they are twins, the character could easily be a young man suffering from a multiple personality disorder. The ever-masterful Ciaran Hinds may be relegated to a bit role, but he plays it with enough gravity to consistently draw the eye. Kevin J. O’Connor steals every second he is on screen as Daniel’s “brother from another mother” Henry. O’Connor plays the role with more confidence than his usual characters and that is refreshing to see. Even child (not, as it turns out) actor Dillon Freasier is impressive in the role of H.W.

But where There Will Be Blood has a tendency to fall down is in the character details. Why does H.W. burn Henry’s bed? Why doesn’t Daniel move on from the one set of rigs when his oil empire expands? How the hell does P.T. Anderson expect us to care about the climactic events between Daniel and H.W. and Daniel and Eli when some fifteen years elapse in the narrative?!

Anderson makes There Will Be Blood move along, despite long stretches without dialogue. And There Will Be Blood looks beautiful. The film is shot with great framing, wonderful scenery and special effects that look entirely real. In fact, I cannot think of a film in recent memory I have looked forward to watching the bonus features for as much as There Will Be Blood. But is it Anderson’s best? Not by a long shot. Fortunately, it is nowhere near his worst, either.

For other works with Paul Dano, please check out my reviews of:
12 Years A Slave
Looper
Cowboys & Aliens
Knight And Day
Where The Wild Things Are
Fast Food Nation
Little Miss Sunshine

6.5/10

For other film reviews, please check out my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Ponderous And Slow, Lincoln Was Certainly Not The Best Picture Of 2012!

The Good: Amazing cast, Decent concept
The Bad: Weird characters, Very slow, Dull direction
The Basics: Vastly overrated, Lincoln is little more than a political process story with one of the weirdest characters in recent memory.


When it comes to Oscar Pandering Season, there are several films that have counted on a “shock and awe” approach to getting nominated. I was actually quite thrilled that last year, Argo (reviewed here!) won the Best Picture. I was happy because, for the first time in quite some time, the winner was not a December release that was counting on the fervor of award season to get nominated. It was a smart, well-developed film with all the aspects that make for a great film worthy of the Best Picture honor. There were a number of films last year that I did not manage to see prior to the award ceremony and the one I wanted to see most was Lincoln .

I’m over that now. Having sat through Lincoln, I was surprised by how very little I enjoyed it. Lincoln is a great example of a film with an amazing cast with a story and characters that does little to allow them to actually rise to the heights of their talents. But more importantly, Lincoln does what something like The West Wing (reviewed here!) was often too smart to avoid doing; it shows the full intricacies of a process story. Behind the scenes of politics is often disappointing, but (as Lincoln proves adequately) it is even more often boring. Not so much about Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln is about the harrowing process of getting the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution (abolition of slavery) passed. It’s a lot of wheeling and dealing and it is not at all exciting or even particularly engaging.

Two months after Abraham Lincoln’s re-election to the Presidency of the United States of America, the American Civil War is stretching into its fourth bloody year. After visiting the Front, Lincoln returns to Washington, determined to get the House Of Representatives to pass his Amendment to the Constitution that would Constitutionally abolish slavery and create equal rights under the law. Lincoln explains to his cabinet that the Amendment is necessary to both ending the Civil War and avoiding the legal quagmires that the Emancipation Proclamation created.

As Lincoln meets with his visiting son, the President’s lackeys Bilbo and Latham, try to sway the few Democrats they need to pass the Amendment through patronage and bribes. With envoys of the Confederacy approaching to talk peace, Lincoln and the chief advocate for equality in the House, Thaddeus Stevens, work desperately to pass the Amendment . . . regardless of the consequences.

The story is far less a character study, which is what makes Lincoln so pedantic. Instead, it is a blend of Abraham Lincoln characterized as a meandering weirdo, unable to keep real focus or make a point concisely, and long stretches of political process. The personal aspects of Lincoln are most frequently part of subplots illustrating Lincoln’s relationships with his son Robert – who stands up for himself to enlist – and Mary Todd (who spends time acting appropriately unbalanced). Neither of those subplots are particularly compelling.

More than the writing, I blame this on the direction. Given how the movie poster for Lincoln is a tight shot of Daniel Day-Lewis as Abraham Lincoln, close and craggy-faced, it is astonishing how little Spielberg actually goes in for the close shot. Yelling, in a quiet conversation with Elizabeth Keckley, and seldom else does Spielberg go in for the close shot to actually allow Day-Lewis’s performance occupy the screen. As a result, the viewer is left disconnected from Abraham Lincoln and Daniel Day-Lewis’s odd portrayal of him.

As a result, it is Tommy Lee Jones as Stevens who actually steals Lincoln (as much as such a theft is possible). Stevens is principled and smart and he represents a focused strategist in the fight to pass the Amendment. Tommy Lee Jones plays Stevens as passionate and aged beyond his years, making for a compelling performance. And Steven Spielberg actually puts the camera close on him to make him more than just a setpiece in a large room.

Lincoln is a lot of talking and I can enjoy a good movie that is filled with people talking. But Lincoln is seldom interesting characters saying any compelling, intrinsically human, truth. Instead, far more often, it is a bunch of old white men bitching about the process to pass a vote. For this particular story, there need not be such a quality cast; the impressive cast here cannot rise to the occasion to make it engaging.

For other historical dramas, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
Gandhi
All The President’s Men
Frost/Nixon

4/10

For other movie reviews, please visit my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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The Gangs Of New York Is A Lacking Tale Of Revenge And History

The Good: Daniel Day-Lewis, Moments of directing
The Bad: Howard Shore's soundtrack, Lack of use of quality actors, Romantic subplot, Idiot characters
The Basics: When gangs ruled the Five Points of New York City, Irish immigrants rise up against the Native New Yorkers in a dull tale of revenge and confused character types.


Most everyone says that Martin Scorsese is a genius and it's easy to see why when watching The Gangs Of New York. Scorsese has a great eye for movement and framing and using the camera to tell the story he wants to tell. He populates his film with talented actors and has a decent sense of pacing. Unfortunately, there is little that lives up to his potential genius in this film.

The Gangs Of New York begins with the slaughter of the Dead Rabbit gang in the Five Points in New York City (made even more distracting by the time frame of the massacre being given after the battle as opposed to before). This is not a big plot revelation as anyone who knows movies can figure that Liam Neeson's character will not survive given he is not billed near the top in the credits. Priest Vallon is killed and sixteen years later, his son, Amsterdam, comes looking for revenge. He quickly absorbs into the corrupt New York City run by Boss Tweed and Bill the Butcher, the man who killed Priest. Amsterdam gets closer to Bill until he is exposed and leads an Irish revolution against the "Native" New Yorkers and the Civil War draft changes everything.

First, the high points. Daniel Day-Lewis is phenomenal as Bill the Butcher. He brings William Cutting to life with a crooked grin, an expert sense of timing and a fury and ferocity that is unlike anything he has ever done on film before. There is no trace of his subtle and likable character from The Last Of The Mohicans, nor his dull, plodding character from The Age Of Innocence. Here, Day-Lewis performs and convinces the viewer he is someone and something totally different, a corrupt killer. In short, he does everything an actor is supposed to with smashing results.

Unfortunately, Day-Lewis is the exception to the rule. A lot of talented actors appear in The Gangs Of New York and are woefully neglected and/or ignored completely. Jim Broadbent's Tweed is decent, but remains almost entirely a peripheral character. The acting talents of John C. Reilly and Brendan Gleeson are almost entirely wasted in the bit roles they perform in this movie. Similarly, Liam Neeson's performance is too easy to neglect given that the entirety of his performance is in the first fifteen minutes of a 166 minute epic.

The real loser of The Gangs Of New York (outside the viewer who sits through the entire thing), is the story. We've seen revenge stories before. I happen to like a decent story of revenge and intrigue. This is not that. It has all of the same, old cliches. Parent is killed, disappears, returns years later with vengeance on their mind, gets close to killer, is discovered, the situation moves to a resolution. Even the confused, out of the subtext ending that might surprise some, seems canned and serves only to rob the film of a decent catharsis. Instead, the conflict between Amsterdam and the Butcher seems simply like it wasn't worth resolving. It's a lot of blood and violence to lead to a vengeance not worth the effort to resolve.

Moreover, the romantic subplot, and I use the term "romantic" loosely, in The Gangs Of New York between Amsterdam and Jenny is both entirely cliche and tacked on. There is an attempt to make triangle issues between Amsterdam, Jenny and the Butcher, but it feels like a cheap romantic tool used to add a woman to the mix. In short, Cameron Diaz's Jenny feels like a character added at the last moment so there could be some sort of romantic interest for Amsterdam and it fails to engage the viewer. Instead, we feel like we are being cheated because it distracts from the emotional intensity of the revenge plot. This is a rare instance where the film would have been fine without trying to balance the cast and it might have made a more powerful commentary to show the obsession of the vengeful son to not include anything as redemptive (or in this case, obscuring) as a romantic attachment.

Like Jenny, many of the characters are simply archetypes that fit into a rather generic role in the larger storytelling mythos. The problem is, we - as viewers - want actual characters and end up woefully disappointed by The Gangs Of New York. The let down here is that almost all of the characters turn out to be complete idiots in the end. For example, Brendan Gleeson's world-weary warrior Monk transforms in an instant from a battle-hardened soldier and mentor to Amsterdam into an idealistic moron who is willing to turn his back on the greatest villain he has ever known. And unfortunately, he is not the exception in this movie, he embodies the rule. All of the characters defy their better judgment and the common sense of the viewer by reversing their own wariness and anger.

My final problem with The Gangs Of New York was Howard Shore's derivative score for the movie. As a big fan of The Lord Of The Rings saga (reviewed here!), I was surprised while watching The Gangs Of New York to find many similarities in the soundtrack to the Trilogy, especially in the battle scenes. This disappointment was amplified when Howard Shore's name came up in the credits; the similarity was the result of Shore's sudden lack of musical imagination and it plagues the movie as Shore attempts to link (musically) gang-ridden New York City to Middle Earth. That's just wrong.

In short, The Gangs Of New York may have had potential and there are stylistic elements like directing and costume design that work in its favor, but the potential is never reached because the actors are underused or are playing characters with such contrast to sensibility that they are almost unwatchable and ultimately not relatable.

For other films with Jim Broadbent, be sure to check out my takes on:
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, Part 2
Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince
Inkheart
Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull
The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe
Nicholas Nickleby
Bridget Jones’s Diary
Smilla’s Sense Of Snow
Brazil

5/10

For other film reviews, be sure to check out my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2004 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Ack, No! Another Victorian Film Like the Rest! A Room With A View

The Good: Acting, I suppose, Scenery
The Bad: Predictable plot, Lack of distinct characters, Divisions in scenes
The Basics: A Room With A View is a dreadfully dull film that is plagued by being easy to watch, but impossible to care about the people involved.


There's a distinct period of British literature I find deplorable because it comprises almost a complete century of works where every author tells the same story. I mean almost literally, the same exact story. What differentiates these works is the characters. The most enduring of these works (Villette, Jane Eyre) have stronger characters that are laced with deeper levels that come out in the work. Unfortunately, the film A Room With A View offers no such distinction.

A Room With A View is an explicitly set work (every time the setting changes, there is a break in the film with a placard informing the viewer where the action is now and who is in the scene) surrounding Lucy Honeychurch. Lucy begins her journey in Florence, Italy, where she meets other British people on vacation. One of these individuals is George Emerson. George is a brooding man who ponders the world until Lucy's mere presence in his life opens him up to there being more in life than thought and the pain of the world. So, he kisses Lucy.

This inspires the young Lucy to return to England, where she promptly engages herself to Cecil. Sound abrupt? Well, it seems abrupt in the film as well. I sat watching wondering WHY?! It seemed such a drastic action. But that's Olde England with all of its emotional repression customs. Fortunately, this is dealt with explicitly in the film. Cecil is a bore and a bookworm and when George moves in near Lucy's family, she realizes what we've all figured out: that George and Lucy work better together and they ought to be married.

What works is the acting. Daniel Day-Lewis plays the dry Cecil wonderfully, a complete contrast to other characters I've seen him play. He is stuffy and repressed and plays Cecil up for all he is. Too bad there's not much of him to play up. Helena Bonham Carter portrays Lucy well. She's convincing as a youth of a changing England. Julian Sands plays George competently and Judi Dench plays the somewhat-annoying Miss Lavish perfectly. The scene stealer is also the only decent character: Mr. Emerson who is played with humor and vitality by Denholm Elliott. His scenes are a pleasure to watch as he is a radical and actually lives. He's like a post-epiphany Lester Burnham and it's nice to see that. Miss Lavish is similar, but played as an egotist.

The scenery is nice as well.

What doesn't work is that none of the characters (outside Mr. Emerson) are interesting, captivating, or even enough to keep the plot going at a reasonable pace. The direction is nothing to shout about and the plot has been done to death. Moreover, I found the breaks between scenes that explicitly set up the next scene like chapter titles distracting and detrimental to the flow of the film.

As a final note, this film is unrated, at least the old VCR tape I was watching. I suspect that has to do with the single scene in which three men are running around naked. Outside that, the film is G. With that, it's still no big deal.

For other films featuring Helena Bonham-Carter, please visit my reviews of:
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, Part 2
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, Part 1
The King's Speech
Alice In Wonderland
Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince
Terminator: Salvation
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street
Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix
Corpse Bride
Charlie And The Chocolate Factory
Big Fish
Fight Club

3/10

For other movie reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2002 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

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Epic Biography Worth Watching, Gandhi Is Inspirational And Entertaining!

The Good: Great story, Wonderful character development, Amazing acting, Incredible DVD bonus features
The Bad: Intermission, A few storytelling gaps
The Basics: A truly great biopic, Gandhi captures the essence of the live of Mahatma Gandhi and his quest to nonviolently free India from British rule.


There are any number of films that I would openly and eagerly acknowledge as great that I would never want to watch more than once. So, it is with increasing pleasure that I encounter new-to-me films that live up to their hyped greatness that I would actually want to watch again and again. Gandhi is one of those films. I originally saw Gandhi on video when I was far too young to appreciate the film. Now, I watched the film with a more developed political acumen and the truth is, I cannot wait to make this part of my permanent collection. Gandhi is a perfect film and on the two-disc DVD set, it is an extraordinary work.

That said, while I enjoyed Gandhi in a highbrow way with an artistic appreciation and a sense of political intelligence that has grown in me since my youth, I was surprised by how frequently I geeked out at the film. When director Richard Attenborough appeared on screen to introduce Gandhi, I recognized him from his acting in Jurassic Park. Similarly, I was exceptionally pleased to see a very young Martin Sheen appear on screen. Sheen, who dazzled me from The West Wing (reviewed here!), appeared early in the film as the reporter, Walker, and I squealed in a way that would be embarrassing, had anyone been with me at the time. Gandhi is a biography of the Indian leader Mohandas (or Mahatma, the name is credited both ways on the film) Gandhi and it is based on history; this review is simply of the Richard Attenborough film Gandhi, not historical fact. As such, some discrepancies may exist in the "character" in the film vs. the historical figure. That said, Attenborough and writer John Briley do a great job of inserting recognizable quotes from Mohandas Gandhi into the film.

As a young lawyer, Mohandas Gandhi is called to help mediate a dispute in British South Africa when he is thrown off a train for sitting in his first class cabin. Furious about this, Gandhi leads a demonstration where he encourages the nonwhite citizens of the British Empire to burn their passbooks, in defiance of the unjust law. This leads to the change in law and Gandhi returns to India as a hero. After riding the rails all around India, Gandhi changes the movement of the nationalists in India toward nonviolent resistance and a movement that will benefit the common Indian, as opposed to just the educated elite.

His popularity growing, Gandhi helps to bring the Muslim and Hindu factions of India together to resist the British influence together. Arrested for petty crimes and protests, Gandhi is viewed as a hero in his homeland. Stripping himself of everything but his homespun garments, he walks around India organizing protests, preaching nonviolent resistance and confronting the systems which keep India enslaved to the British. With his wife and friends, he works to end tyranny and make a free India.

Gandhi openly acknowledges that this is not the complete story of Mohandas Gandhi and the end of the British imperial influence there, but rather the highlights of the life of Gandhi. From the outset, the film wisely emphasizes that Gandhi held no political or religious office and Attenborough captures well both the emotions of the unified Muslim and Hindu Indians, as well as the tragedy that comes when India is divided up. Every riot is filmed with a mood of frustration and the soundtrack by Ravi Shankar and George Fenton is understated and makes an emotional resonance of the loss of humanity whenever violence breaks out. The only aspect of the film that truly feels less inspired than it ought to is the intermission at the midpoint of the movie (I suppose in 1982, moviegoers didn't want to sit for three hours straight).

Gandhi is a great story and the triumph of the film is that Attenborough and Briley make a conflict that is essentially philosophical cinematic. The movie looks great throughout, despite a surprisingly bleak color palate dominated by tan, brown and white. For a film packed with people talking for long periods of time, the movie always has a sense of movement to it and this makes it a great use of the medium. As well, the film does not shy away from the difficulty of violence. This makes Gandhi an unsettling PG film; people walk into the bats of soldiers and as the film progresses, riots between Hindu and Muslims are graphically depicted. Attenborough gets great mileage out of his extras in that he captures mobs of people looking furious in ways that are unsettling to watch.

What makes Gandhi so great a story is not just the plot of resistance and fighting a good fight, but rather the characters. Mohandas Gandhi is a great historical and cinematic figure who has a compelling journey. Giving up wealth and status, Gandhi takes a moral stand. He is accompanied by his wife, Kasturba, who takes up social causes for the women, which Mohandas openly supports. Those looking for a strong female protagonist will find it in Kasturba, as she takes his place when Gandhi is arrested or unable to speak. Similarly, the film does a great job of fleshing out characters like Nehru, who rises with Gandhi and becomes the political leader to parallel Mohandas's philosophical growth.

When it comes to Gandhi, there is an amazing cast, but there is only one role that truly blows viewers out of the water. That is the performance by Sir Ben Kingsley and he is absolutely amazing. Just as people came to see Frank Langella as Richard Nixon in Frost/Nixon, Kingsley takes on the role of Gandhi against the prejudices of common sense. Deeply tanned and with contacts, the usually bulkier actor is slimmed down into the role of the familiar-looking social leader and the resemblance becomes uncanny. Kingsley simply IS Gandhi from the moment he first appears on screen and there is not a moment of the film where his facade and cool slip.

On DVD, Gandhi has an amazing two-disc special edition. The first disc is all the film and features a commentary track with Attenborough talking about the production, sometimes gushing more about it than actually providing useful information. But the second disc has nine featurettes on the historical figure of Gandhi and the making of the film and it is an amazing resource for those who are interested in the leader or the movie. As well, there is a treasure trove of historical footage of the actual Gandhi and a great interview wherein Kingsley speaks about Gandhi and making the film. Everything one could ever want to know about the film is here on this two-disc DVD and it looks and sounds great on DVD.

This is an essential DVD for anyone who loves world history and anyone who is prepared to be entertained and enlightened by the story of a truly great historical figure. Gandhi is an inspiring story of a man leading a nation to stand up for itself and is well worth the time and attention of anyone who loves great cinema.

[As a winner of the Best Picture Oscar, this is part of my Best Picture Project available here! Please check it out!]

For other historical dramas, please visit my reviews on:
Charlie Wilson's War
Flash Of Genius
Memoirs Of A Geisha

9.5/10

For other film reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.



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