Today’s post begins with a fractal called Starry, Starry Night. It seemed like a good choice for the movie review of Stardust.
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Stardust may be one of the best movies you’ll never see: yes, it’s a fairy tale but one with real magic. It manages, through good writing and sound directing, to construct a believable world with heart and a genuinely interesting story--and it doesn’t require a huge budget or big name star-power to do it.
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The story stakes place in Victorian England where a wall separates the mundane world from the magical kingdom of Stormhold. Young Tristan (earnestly played by unknown Charlie Cox) is madly in love with Victoria (Sienna Miller) and promises to bring her a star from the sky to prove it. He crosses the forbidden wall into Stormhold and runs into Yvaine (Claire Danes) the star knocked out of the sky by the kingdom’s dying monarch (Peter O’Toole in a brief but delightful cameo). The star is also being hunted by the witch Lamia (Michelle Pfeifer who does a fine job here and revels in her “ugly” makeup) and the king’s three surviving sons. (He had seven and the throne was to go to the last survival: in a delightful little aside, the ghosts of the departed brothers stick around to the end of the movie.) Robert De Niro plays “Captain Shakespeare” and is on screen for too brief a time but his role is truly magnificent. Tristan’s father, Victoria’s suitor Harvey, the hapless Princes, “Dirtwater Sal” (a traveling witch) her slave Una (the brothers’ long-missing sister) and Lamia’s two less-than-willing associates are all played delightfully by unknown (at least here) actors.
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The plot is a combination of “Hero’s Quest” (Tristan even says it!) and “Romantic Fantasy”--elements that have been around since the story-telling Dawn of Time. You’ve seen it before but the characters and cinematography elevates it above the mundane. Yes, there are a few occasions where I wished I could reach through the screen and pop both Tristan and Yvaine upside the head and once or twice the pace drags a bit but the good qualities far outweigh the bad. The FX are barely above TV standards these days but they are more than adequate for the job, In fact, one of the most delightful things about this movie is the way the on-screen world is created in a completely believable way.
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Is Stardust the best movie you’ll never see? Probably not--but it’s pretty darn good. It suffered from a horrible release date (in the middle of a huge “summer movie” season) and was cheated out of the wider audience it deserves: I think Stardust would have done a lot better had it been released in October or during the spring. In my opinion it will hold up well over the years and become a fantasy classic.
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FINAL GRADE: A
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Stardust may be one of the best movies you’ll never see: yes, it’s a fairy tale but one with real magic. It manages, through good writing and sound directing, to construct a believable world with heart and a genuinely interesting story--and it doesn’t require a huge budget or big name star-power to do it.
-
The story stakes place in Victorian England where a wall separates the mundane world from the magical kingdom of Stormhold. Young Tristan (earnestly played by unknown Charlie Cox) is madly in love with Victoria (Sienna Miller) and promises to bring her a star from the sky to prove it. He crosses the forbidden wall into Stormhold and runs into Yvaine (Claire Danes) the star knocked out of the sky by the kingdom’s dying monarch (Peter O’Toole in a brief but delightful cameo). The star is also being hunted by the witch Lamia (Michelle Pfeifer who does a fine job here and revels in her “ugly” makeup) and the king’s three surviving sons. (He had seven and the throne was to go to the last survival: in a delightful little aside, the ghosts of the departed brothers stick around to the end of the movie.) Robert De Niro plays “Captain Shakespeare” and is on screen for too brief a time but his role is truly magnificent. Tristan’s father, Victoria’s suitor Harvey, the hapless Princes, “Dirtwater Sal” (a traveling witch) her slave Una (the brothers’ long-missing sister) and Lamia’s two less-than-willing associates are all played delightfully by unknown (at least here) actors.
-
The plot is a combination of “Hero’s Quest” (Tristan even says it!) and “Romantic Fantasy”--elements that have been around since the story-telling Dawn of Time. You’ve seen it before but the characters and cinematography elevates it above the mundane. Yes, there are a few occasions where I wished I could reach through the screen and pop both Tristan and Yvaine upside the head and once or twice the pace drags a bit but the good qualities far outweigh the bad. The FX are barely above TV standards these days but they are more than adequate for the job, In fact, one of the most delightful things about this movie is the way the on-screen world is created in a completely believable way.
-
Is Stardust the best movie you’ll never see? Probably not--but it’s pretty darn good. It suffered from a horrible release date (in the middle of a huge “summer movie” season) and was cheated out of the wider audience it deserves: I think Stardust would have done a lot better had it been released in October or during the spring. In my opinion it will hold up well over the years and become a fantasy classic.
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FINAL GRADE: A
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