This is a gentle story of the relationship between a young working-class actor and film star Gloria Graeme in her declining years. I've got to admit this never quite captured me - despite their best efforts, neither Jamie Bell or Annette Bening quite come into focus - Bening's Graeme is too much the dopey former sexpot in a way that I think diminishes her, and Bell's Peter Turner is a little too vaguely defined -he's clearly young and northern, but the various elements of his character never quite turn into something solid and clearly expressing why he's so interested in this woman - perhaps because it's so based on Turner's book, the film's never really able to give him any possible darker motives (like enjoying the proximity to fame) that might have made this more interesting.
I was also slightly more amused than I probably should be at the way the film goes out of its way to avoid mentioning the title and topic of the play Turner is performing (clearly it's "Having a Ball", Alan Bleasdale's play about a vasectomy clinic - they liked the prestige of Bleasdale but didn't want to admit the subject matter!). Turner's home life with his mum (Julie Waters) and his brother (Stephen Graeme) is out of the working-class cliche book. All in all, this is pretty clunky material.
No comments:
Post a Comment