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Bright Star (2009)

Director: Jane Campion

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20 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

Click here to read a interview with director Campion

Not a great deal happens in ‘Bright Star’, Jane Campion’s breezy and beautiful film about the nineteenth-century British poet John Keats (played by Ben Whishaw). The New Zealand director’s film is light in the most attractive and dreamy of ways: it floats on its own, intimately explored love story and refuses to be weighed down by either period fixtures and fittings or the later reputation of Keats, whose final years and stalling romance with his neighbour Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish) Campion handles with a smartness and sensitivity that feel teasingly throwaway.

That’s not to say there’s anything slapdash about Campion’s story of how Keats moved in next door to the fatherless Brawne family and fell in love with slightly younger Fanny, tentatively courting her and writing her wonderfully honest letters but fatally kept at a distance by poverty and illness. In fact, for this critic, it’s the exquisite detail of the whole affair, coupled with the aerating winds of modernity that blow gently through the film, rather than the emotional pull of the doomed love affair at its heart, that are the film’s real success. (Others, I must say, differ on this point, judging by the sobs and sniffles to my left and right at the London Film Festival screening of the film.)

A combination of unstuffy dialogue, wise casting, unselfconscious performances and sensuous but never pretty photography makes Campion’s version of the nineteenth century feel current but not anachronistic.

Campion came to Keats’s story, which she shot in Britain last year, after a four-year sabbatical from filmmaking – and it shows, especially following the dark, oppressive atmosphere of ‘In the Cut’, one of her least successful films. Her telling of this biographical tale, inspired by Andrew Motion’s biography, feels as if it’s told by someone with much knowledge but little weight on their shoulders. It’s a feeling one gets from the performances too, especially from Cornish and Whishaw, who both, at times, threaten to float off on a cloud of their characters’ distraction. It’s down to the side players, especially an earthy Kerry Fox as Fanny’s mother and a boisterous Paul Schneider as Keats’s friend and protector Charles Brown, to give the film some vim away from the fog of love. Whishaw, with his troubled air and vulnerable features, is perhaps better as a Romantic lead than a romantic one, and if the film has one crucial failing, it’s that there’s a crucial spark missing between Whishaw and Cornish.

Campion treats Keats’s talent as a given and not a cue for creaky explorations of inspiration and artistic otherness. She weaves his poetry into the drama, calling for it to be spoken naturally and not at all awkwardly by her characters. It’s not easy to follow verse this way, but it certainly inspires the viewer to head straight from the cinema to the bookshop.

Click here to read a interview with director Campion

Author: Dave Calhoun 2009-11-03 10:54:14

Time Out London Issue 2046: 5-11 November, 2009

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User reviews of this film

discerning cineasta said...

Posted on Nov 22 2009 00:55 absolute tosh, one dimensional, predictable, pointless, misjudged, contrived, inauthentic film about some young acting graduates, who are a long way from understanding or mastering their craft, getting to ponse around in admittedly beautiful but inauthentic period frocks. From the glaswegian queen, to the blue denim dress, to the a capella voices competing with the poem at the end, why oh why oh why, all the fuss? Most irritating is that the cooing critics mean that this sort of rubbish will continue to consume funding for the creative cinematic arts when there are so many original, imaginative, intelligent, able and gifted filmmakers with so much more interesting things to say about the world we live in, who have not been funded so that, how many people in the italian crew? (for what seemed to be a 30 second sequence at the spanish steps) can galavant pretending they are making an important film. The only saving grace was the photography which was skillful and picturesque and would have lent authenticity had the colours not been b'stardised in the editing suite.

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Phil Ince said...

Posted on Nov 19 2009 12:54 I saw this film again last weekend. Reading the other comments here, I see the majority found it dull. Both times, I found it moving and engaging but difficult to talk about afterwards. Seeing it a second time, I did notice that there was something lacking in some of the dialogue (and wonder if some of the better lines are drawn from letters?). One puzzle for me both times was who lived where and in proximity to whom. It was unclear to me from the outset who was living in what house and when, and that muddle was a distraction.
Most people have said that it's a good looking film - though the initial CGI of smoking cottage chimneys is unconvincing. However, they variously question or condemn the performances, dialogue and pace.
It is a film that runs at a very human rate (4 miles per hour at most) but that seems to me to be a chief part of its appeal. It isn't a film about Keats but about Fanny Brawne (and her family's) feelings for him. It does seem to me to be a distinctly feminine film describing the impact of nature and convention on the lives and fates of the characters in it.
I don't know Keats' story and I may only be responding to the potent and growing emotion as Fanny and John's successive separations occur. It is a very simple and direct film and isn't a 'sophisticated' in that it's not at all intellectual but it isn't a pot boiler either; melodrama, certainly, but not false or contrived.
I continue to wonder if the fact that I struggle to find much to say may be an indication fo the film's (and my own) weaknesses. But equally, I wonder, if the capacity of a thing to provoke a clear verbal and intellectual response isn't the only measure of a success.
I'm truly surprised that many felt it thin and dull because it seemed to me full of life.

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jools said...

Posted on Nov 18 2009 08:22 Zzzzzz.....

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philmk said...

Posted on Nov 16 2009 14:18 The whole audience stayed to the end of the credits, as the narrator recited a Keats poem - don't remember which one. It's possible it took that long for the audience to wake up at the end of the film. Some of the photography was lovely, beautiful shots of the apple orchard. The actress playing Fanny, and the cat, were both lovely. The film was far too long, though.

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Terry said...

Posted on Nov 16 2009 07:31 Awful, torture having to sit through it. Completely without interest at any level.

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noddy3636 said...

Posted on Nov 15 2009 17:30 Dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull

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Katie said...

Posted on Nov 14 2009 20:49 Truly the most appalling film I have ever seen.
The critics are speaking absolute nonsense! I have never in my life wanted to walk out of the cinema, but I could not wait to leave this flaccid, pretentious piece of nonsense. In terms of acting ability, Whishaw had absolutely nothing behind the eyes. He tells Fanny that they 'will never see each other again on this earth' with as much passion as if he were ordering a Chinese takeaway. Yet again, the casting directors have gone for looks over acting ability. Emotion pours from the actress playing Fanny (and admittedly there is a decent moment where she breaks down) but one wonders whether she is simply trying to compensate for her wooden acting partner. Most dramatic moment? Fanny quivering, 'Mr Keats has gone to London without his coat'. Most ludicrous moment? Mr Keats underneath a hedge. Somebody PLEASE explain this travesty and then explain the mind-boggling reactions from those who loved it!

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andy said...

Posted on Nov 11 2009 21:17 Don't believe the hype (and the very obviously production company-placed 'positive' punter reviews). This is over-rated and under-heated tosh, high concept Mills and Boon, that doesn't even stack up as a story. Most of the supporting characters have no obvious role or identity (I gave up trying to work out who they all were after about 5 minutes). Worse, it all felt completely historically inauthentic, a 21st century Hollywood-romantic take on early 19th century English romantics. And don't let Andrew Motion's involvement fool you! Simple mistakes like wonky accents (most obviously Brown's ludicrous Scottish). Utterly unengaging, unless you actually like films that consist of little more than interminable sighing and swooning. And it fails the ultimate biopic test of quality - does it make you want to go back and 'rediscover' Keats' work for yourself? Not bloody likely.

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Phil Ince said...

Posted on Nov 11 2009 14:33 A memorable film and the most feminine one I've ever seen. It seems to be a film about the feelings Keats and Fanny Brawne have for one another, rather than a film about their relationship. Fanny's yearning for Keats when he's away reminded me powerfully of what teenage love feels like and the actress' vocalisation of her physical agony when Fanny hears of Keats' death has such a variety of pitch and tone it's almost a piece of music.
Edie Martin as Fanny's sister gives the truest and most natural performance of a child I can ever remember seeing.
It's almost a natural wonder, this film.

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Gabby said...

Posted on Nov 10 2009 23:55 Just returned from seeing Bright Star with such mixed feelings I wanted to check the reviews
I am over 45, but still I wasn't swept away. I felt the parts were all beautiful but the sum of the parts just didn't add up to a whole. I found the heavy editing of so many scenes left me asking why bother to show in the first place. I thought Abigail was really great, where have I seen her before?

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Braxton Hicks said...

Posted on Nov 10 2009 09:52 It's quite an achievement to make a melodrama with passionate young love, tragically early death and some of the greatest works of romantic poetry into a turgid porridge of blank emotion, but Campion manages to do it it.
The look of the film is ravishing, but the pacing, book and performances are so unutterably tedious, that by about halfway through I was hoping that Keats would die as soon as possible. By the end of the film, I would have quite happily have contracted tuberculosis myself just to make it stop
The relationship between Cirnish and Wishaw seems entirely bloodless. Physically, they are horribly mismatched - and the emotional connection is non existent. Neither character is sympathetic, or even engaging.
Kudos to the lighting and cinematography - but save yourself some time and money, go down to the National Gallery and look at some Vermeer. You'll exactly get the same effect, without the two hours of eye rollingly bad cinema.

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david glowacki said...

Posted on Nov 09 2009 23:58 If your over 45 you'll love this film,if your under 45 than there is a possiblity you will think it is tedious and boring.The film is wonderfully slow and long.No sex no violence no swearing.It observes the beauty and sensuousness of living through natures seasons and through loves ups and downs.The little girl "Toots" is the star.However the misery is overdone,but if your older you might appreciate this a bit more. 4 stars

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Rustom said...

Posted on Nov 08 2009 15:38 Hi, agree with your review that it's a good movie and that there's a spark missing between Whishaw and Cornish. That seemed to me to be more Whishaw's fault than Cornish's -- he reminded me of a grungy hipster to be honest more than a romantic (rather than a Romantic) poet -- but maybe that was intentional. What do you mean by "the aerating winds of modernity that blow through the whole film"? The dialogue seemed typical period drama to me -- the performances were very good though. Was there anything else that you noticed that set this apart as a conspicuously "modern" story?

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usman khawaja said...

Posted on Nov 08 2009 07:09 Keats might be a neglected romantic poet but it gives no bobody the right to make a dull ,emotionally devoid and exasperatingly depressing biopic about that poor intellect who was a victim of both british climate and the characters as portrayed in this over the top ABYSMAL melodrama .
While Whishaw is shy and introverted ,Cornish behaves like a victorian feminist who all but burns her bra in pursuit of keats ,offerring sex in so many words to a sick dying man .
Campion handles a sensitive tragic true LOVE story as a artifice like a designer movie with every thing from lilac flower fields and meadows to wintry frozen england ,and tea services and country estates where these rather semi baked characters and semi directed actors actors bring misery by reciting keat's verses in dingy country estates .
if that is not enough we have a cat ,a promiscuous housemaid ,class system divides ,and the persistent repetitive reminders that keat is a poor suitor for fanny brawne ,who is being prepared for husband hunting by her mother.
Poor keats is as unaffective as Whishaw looks sick and pallid while he recants some of his poetry in obligatory persuasion ,while conish recites most of it as an excuse to understand and learn poetry .
The tears flow as freely as the melodrama assumes hysterical proportions and it is reduced to a damp and dismal experience which leaves you cold and drenched in a mist of boredom .
no wonder keats escaped to rome as these are enough reasons to whisk away -
what a hugely disappointing overacted melodramatic and insanely hysterical poorly costumed period drama which can be made in 40 odd minutes and is dragged to 120 minutes and you feel every one second of those long dreary moments .

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stee said...

Posted on Nov 04 2009 11:27 Saw a preview screening of this a couple of weeks ago. Have no idea why this has been so lauded over... this was probably the single most unengaging, dull and tedious film I've ever seen. Tried to get into the story, but all the characters are impentrable, and kept completely at arms length. The film looks great, and there are moment of humanity, but otherwise a cold, heartless film, which had me yawning from about 10 minutes in and went downhill after that. A waste of 90 minutes if you ask me.

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