Vanity Fair Review
by Jon Popick (jpopick AT sick-boy DOT com)August 30th, 2004
PLANET SICK-BOY: http://www.sick-boy.com
"We Put the SIN in Cinema"
© Copyright 2004 Planet Sick-Boy. All Rights Reserved.
Admittedly, Vanity Fair is not my cup of tea, but I still approached my screening with a relatively open mind. It didn't help. Now I want to cave in Reese Witherspoon's head with a rock, and dig up William Makepeace Thackeray's corpse so I can drop it into that stuff that killed Robert Patrick in Terminator 2. It's not that I hate all period films, or anything. Just the ones that are pointless, full of bad acting, and feel like they're five hours long. I do, however, have an apparent dislike for anything cranked out by director Mira Nair (Monsoon Wedding). The thought of her being in the running for a Harry Potter film makes me want drink Clorox. Believe me, you'll feel the same way after sitting through hour after boring hour of Fair, and then wondering what the hell is happening when the Britney Spears video temporarily takes over the film.
Thackeray's novel, adapted here by a trio of screenwriters (including Gosford Park's Julian Fellows) follows the life of a dullard named Rebecca Sharp (Witherspoon, Legally Blonde 2). Though she has no money and even less social standing, Rebecca manages to hook up with a string of increasingly rich people and lives fairly high on the hog before it all comes crashing down in Fair's final reel. In that way, Fair is a little like The House of Mirth. More so, when you think about both pictures being headed by amber-haired actresses who are in way over their heads. Mirth didn't have the Britney video, though.
Personally, I would have rather seen a film about the Crawley family, into which Rebecca eventually marries. They're kind of like a 19th century version of the Bluths from Arrested Development, complete with a crazy aunt played by Cold Mountain's Eileen Atkins, who represents the only redeeming quality of Fair. Aside from her, we're talking about a film way more concerned about costumes than things like story, acting and.oh, yeah - emotion. Extremely disappointing considering the cast, which includes Romola Garai, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Gabriel Byrne, Jim Broadbent, Bob Hoskins and Rhys Ifans.
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
