Returning to London from my part of France has already yielded benefits: plush cinema seats, posh Green & Black chocolate and mineral water supplied, for a couple of notable gala screenings ...
Twice over the weekend, Tube journeys into London had Salut! as close to superstars as he ever was to Col Gaddafi (the other side of a coffee table in Tripoli, just before it collapsed under the weight of a heaving bodyguard/media mob), or has been to Nicolas Sarkozy (in the same room, more than once).
My judgement as a film critic has been known to be questioned. However, I am happy to proclaim my admiration for Trishna, Michael Winterbottom's inspired transposition, loosely speaking, of Thomas Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented , from Wessex to India.
A gala screening, presented by the London Film Festival, had me listening to Winterbottom and the female lead, Freida Pinto, who made her name in Slumdog Millionaire, in a question and answer session at the end. I was close to rubbing shoulders with both as we all filed out afterwards.
Despite that fleeting intimacy, my approval of the film is subject to some reservations.
I did appreciate the deliberate freedom Winterbottom gave his cast with the dialogue. And it is far too long since I read the Hardy novel for me to express a view on how closely it is followed, albeit when shifted to another continent and age. For its own sake, however, it worked, not least because of the quite stunning cinematography.
But of the criticisms I have seen, David Gritten's comments in The Daily Telegraph about the performance of Riz Ahmed as the male star, Jay, rang true. Ahmed is an accomplished actor but not sufficiently to manage the abrupt transition of his character from sensitive, likeable lover to unthinking, brutish control freak. We are shown his (unjustified) anger and sense of deceit at Trishna's abortion, but the hardening of his soul incongruously follows implicit recognition on his part that he had been harsh.
This, it seems to me, is an important flaw with the film, but not a fatal one. I disagree, for example, with Gritten's view that Pinto's is altogether too regal a beauty to fit the role of a woman accustomed to working the fields. The scenes showing her suffering - after a road accident, when unexpectedly pregnant, enduring sexual abuse - were convincing enough. A film depicting grim lives should not depend for artistic success on a choice of physically charmless main characters to make them credible.
My second successive trip to the West End - there should be some kind of award for such diligence - took me, and a couple of thousand others, along the red carpet into the Empire for Madonna's big moment as director, the premiere for her interpretation of the Edward VIII/Wallis Simpson story.
The tickets were a daughter's gift. My interest to declare is that her name appears in the credits; you had to look hard but it was an unmissable feature if you happened to be her parents) But while I cannot say W.E. had an impact on me equivalent to that of Trishna, it remains a film I would have paid to see without feeling cheated.
It looks good, indeed it often looks great, benefits from some noble performances and provides ample proof that Madonna has ability as a filmmaker. The juxtaposition of a fictional storyline alongside the true-life royal romance was a dangerous choice, but just about worked for me. The inclusion of a couple of dance scenes drawing on the music of the Sex Pistols and Chubby Checker did not; it seemed derivative of Sofia Coppola's rock gimmickry, no more successful in my eyes, in Marie Antoinette.
There is, of course, a much less kind view, or set of views. Xan Brooks in The Guardian found W.E "extraordinarily silly, preening, fatally mishandled". I did not see a masterpiece, but nor did I see anything living down to that description.
In the end, neither view will matter. Madonna has a big enough army of admirers to suggest her film stands a good chance of both paying its way and pleasing the public.
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