Face of an Angel (15.)
Directed by Michael Winterbottom.
Starring Daniel Bruhl, Cara Delevingne, Kate Beckinsale and Valerio Mastandrea. Partly subtitled. 100 mins
There is a very strong case for not making a film about the murder of British student Meredith Kercher in Perugia in 2007. Fascinating as it is, why would you want to join the queue for the Foxy Knoxy feeding frenzy? But the arguments for making a film about not making a film about the Meredith Kercher murder case are so flimsy even an Italian police force wouldn't pursue them.
Michael Winterbottom has meta-form in this area. His Cock and Bull Story was a film about making a film of Tristam Shandy. Instead of the book you got some knockabout banter between Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon that was plenty entertaining but still felt like a cop out. In Face of an Angel, instead of a film about the murder, we get …. well, next to nothing really. Joyless film director (Bruhl) clumps around Sienna, (replacing Perugia) doing research, criticising journalistic standards, snorting coke, feeling bad about the end of his marriage, skyping his young daughter, hanging out with a young English student (Delevingne) and wondering how he can turn the story into a modern day version of Dante's Divine Comedy.
It would help if our protagonist wasn't such a self absorbed dullard. At one point he sits on the terrace of his hotel, a breathtaking swathe of Tuscan landscape behind him. “Nice view,” prompts his journalist contact Beckinsale; “Yes” he grunts in reply as if he is too grand to care about such trivialities.
Of course there is something enormously honourable about Winterbottom's desire to strike against the hegemony of the whodunnit, to not make trivial entertainment out of murder but to try instead give the crime the tragic weight it deserves. But to then make the story background elements for a middle aged film director 8½ style mid life crisis is actually even more insulting. And it is frustrating because of all the boring bloody murder mysteries in all the world here's one that really is compelling, one that despite all the hours poured over it, refuses to reveal its truth. Someone could make a really good film about it.
Directed by Michael Winterbottom.
Starring Daniel Bruhl, Cara Delevingne, Kate Beckinsale and Valerio Mastandrea. Partly subtitled. 100 mins
There is a very strong case for not making a film about the murder of British student Meredith Kercher in Perugia in 2007. Fascinating as it is, why would you want to join the queue for the Foxy Knoxy feeding frenzy? But the arguments for making a film about not making a film about the Meredith Kercher murder case are so flimsy even an Italian police force wouldn't pursue them.
Michael Winterbottom has meta-form in this area. His Cock and Bull Story was a film about making a film of Tristam Shandy. Instead of the book you got some knockabout banter between Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon that was plenty entertaining but still felt like a cop out. In Face of an Angel, instead of a film about the murder, we get …. well, next to nothing really. Joyless film director (Bruhl) clumps around Sienna, (replacing Perugia) doing research, criticising journalistic standards, snorting coke, feeling bad about the end of his marriage, skyping his young daughter, hanging out with a young English student (Delevingne) and wondering how he can turn the story into a modern day version of Dante's Divine Comedy.
It would help if our protagonist wasn't such a self absorbed dullard. At one point he sits on the terrace of his hotel, a breathtaking swathe of Tuscan landscape behind him. “Nice view,” prompts his journalist contact Beckinsale; “Yes” he grunts in reply as if he is too grand to care about such trivialities.
Of course there is something enormously honourable about Winterbottom's desire to strike against the hegemony of the whodunnit, to not make trivial entertainment out of murder but to try instead give the crime the tragic weight it deserves. But to then make the story background elements for a middle aged film director 8½ style mid life crisis is actually even more insulting. And it is frustrating because of all the boring bloody murder mysteries in all the world here's one that really is compelling, one that despite all the hours poured over it, refuses to reveal its truth. Someone could make a really good film about it.
