i'll be your rock if you'll be my doris
Nov. 24th, 2003 10:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jfbDown With Love, starring Ewan McGregor and Renée Zellweger, is one of my favorite movies of this year. It's an homage to the Rock Hudson-Doris Day romantic comedies of the early 60s--sort of a comedic answer to Todd Haynes's meticulously stylized period drama Far from Heaven.
When I saw it in the theatre, I wrote out an index card full of notes about what I loved, intending to expand them here. Then I procrastinated, and eventually it was gone from theaters, so there wasn't any point to urging people to go see it, but I hung onto my notes so that when it came out on video I could write them up. Now I've just watched the DVD, but I've lost my notes. Here nonetheless are some things I liked.
It's a movie that revels in artifice. A fake moon hangs in the sky of a fake New York. (The UN is across the street from Grand Central Station.) People drive in front of projected street scenes, everything takes place on sound stages, and rain falls on cue when someone's heart is broken.
It's full of wit, something you don't see much these days. The dialogue is fast-paced and full of double entendres, and there are sight gags lurking in every scene. There's stuff to pay attention to.
It's not a musical, but it has something of the musical nature. From the choreographed entrances of Zellwegger and Sarah Paulson to Marc Shaiman's excessively attentive score to the rhythmic patter of the dialogue it's a movie that constantly feels like it's about to burst into song... until the very end, when the leads actually perform a musical number during the credits.
I have no graceful way to bring this up, but I have to mention that the fourth main member of the cast is David Hyde Pierce, one of my favorite comic actors. He's great here.
The first time I saw Down with Love, I just stared agape at the simple fact that anyone with the power to make a studio movie had thought this would be a good idea. Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor--movie stars, sure, but not names that can open a movie--in a film that makes every effort to look like it was made forty years ago? What studio executive would green-light this? But I'm so glad they did.
The DVD has a bunch of extras, including a full-frame version of the closing credits performance, a bunch of mini-documentaries, and a commentary track in which director Peyton Reed (whose cheerleading movie Bring It On I also liked) repeatedly says a bunch of the same things I wrote here, but with more detail.
When I saw it in the theatre, I wrote out an index card full of notes about what I loved, intending to expand them here. Then I procrastinated, and eventually it was gone from theaters, so there wasn't any point to urging people to go see it, but I hung onto my notes so that when it came out on video I could write them up. Now I've just watched the DVD, but I've lost my notes. Here nonetheless are some things I liked.
It's a movie that revels in artifice. A fake moon hangs in the sky of a fake New York. (The UN is across the street from Grand Central Station.) People drive in front of projected street scenes, everything takes place on sound stages, and rain falls on cue when someone's heart is broken.
It's full of wit, something you don't see much these days. The dialogue is fast-paced and full of double entendres, and there are sight gags lurking in every scene. There's stuff to pay attention to.
It's not a musical, but it has something of the musical nature. From the choreographed entrances of Zellwegger and Sarah Paulson to Marc Shaiman's excessively attentive score to the rhythmic patter of the dialogue it's a movie that constantly feels like it's about to burst into song... until the very end, when the leads actually perform a musical number during the credits.
I have no graceful way to bring this up, but I have to mention that the fourth main member of the cast is David Hyde Pierce, one of my favorite comic actors. He's great here.
The first time I saw Down with Love, I just stared agape at the simple fact that anyone with the power to make a studio movie had thought this would be a good idea. Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor--movie stars, sure, but not names that can open a movie--in a film that makes every effort to look like it was made forty years ago? What studio executive would green-light this? But I'm so glad they did.
The DVD has a bunch of extras, including a full-frame version of the closing credits performance, a bunch of mini-documentaries, and a commentary track in which director Peyton Reed (whose cheerleading movie Bring It On I also liked) repeatedly says a bunch of the same things I wrote here, but with more detail.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Far From Heaven
Date: 2003-11-24 03:50 pm (UTC)I will say that Polyester (http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0082926/) is a lot more entertaining after seeing Written On The Wind (http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0049966/) as well.