| Posted by: SAI at January 6, 2004, 10:04 am | | Topic: Reviews: Cold Mountain Forum: JoBlo | | Cold Mountain Dir: Anthony Minghella Stars: Jude Law, Nicole Kidman, Renee Zellweger Review: Given Minghella's last two films, the pedigree of the cast and the good reviews Cold Mountain was a huge disappoinment, a damp squib of an end to a pretty good cinematic year. I'll not rehash the story for those who've not seen the film, I'll just talk about the good and bad points. The Good: It looks great, the cinematography is frequently very beautiful indeed. There are some effective cameo performances from Phillip Seynour Hoffman, Natalie Portman, Jack White and Giovanni Ribisi Renee Zellweger is also good, she does enliven the film with her presence, rescuing it from one star status single handed. This said she's not THAT good in it, it's just that such a lot of what surrounds her is unremittingly awful and she looks better for that. Certainly her performance is unworthy of the much talked about Oscar nomination, she is simply up to the standard that everyone in this film should be reaching. The scenes of violence are well executed but this too is a mixed blessing, since I never really fully engaged with the characters and that made it hard to care about the violence. The Bad: Nicole Kidman is TERRIBLE in this film, her direlogue is little help but she's not been as unconvincing as she is here in many years, she's better in Malice for God's sake. Jude Law isn't as unremittlingly shit as Kidman is here but he delivers a phoned in performance that reeks of work he's taken to pay the bills. Law and Kidman have no chemistry and their romatic longing is justified by 3 scenes so brief and inconsequential that I never for a second bought Law's trek back to her or Kidman's pining for him. In The English Patient the chemistry of Ralph Fiennes and Kristin Scott Thomas was palpable, here it felt like the only reason for the romance was its presence in the script. The middle of the film, Laws side of it in particular, feels like a game of spot the cameo. Decent though many of them are it served to take me out of the film. The ending is quite impactful but so hysterically overplayed by Kidman that it is robbed of emotion and becomes laughable. There is also an entirely superflous an overly cutesy coda, driven, like the rest of the film by dire narration by Kidman. I wish Cold Mountain were a better film (it damn well SHOULD be). As it is this was one of biggest disappointments I've had at the cinema in ages. If it wins even 1 Oscar, let alone Best Picture, it will be a travesty. 2/5 |
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