Oh my, looks like I haven't watched any movie for about two weeks, unbelievable! So let's not waste any valuable space on ridiculously stretched introductions and dive right into Frida!
If you're not living under a rock chances are that you've probably heard about Frida Kahlo, one of the most influential female painters of all time. If you haven't heard of her although you consider yourself somehow sophisticated then don't worry, there's always gonna be some snob like me who's willing to help you out of your misery.
Frida is the movie adaptation of Kahlo's life as an artist and especially focuses on her relationship with fellow artist Diego Rivera. Let's break it down into the parts the movie gets right and the ones where it fails miserably.
The film is directed by Julie Taymor, a strong creative force with a great background in theater and opera work. Mostly thanks to her involvement the film at times rises to be more than just your ordinary conventional biopic and manages to live up to the creativity behind the art genius that was Frida Kahlo. It's like a breath of fresh air to have Taymor play out the New York scenes as if being staged in theater or Frida's imaginations after an accident being acted out by Mexican death dolls.
The casting is perfect, Salma Hayek in the title role and Alfred Molina as her lady-killing husband are extraordinary and share a great chemistry on screen. The minor roles are also prominently cast with roles played by Antonio Banderas, Ashley Judd, Edward Norton and Geoffrey Rush. But here the failure starts.
The movie tries to cram an exceptional life into two hours of screen time and the overwhelming amount of supporting actors and events doesn't give the film enough room to breathe, there's a lack of coherence which becomes more evident towards the end of Frida when the audience realizes how pointless and superfluous many parts were. Geoffrey Rush was wasted as Leon Trotsky and can someone please explain to me what Diego Luna's character was needed for?
Don't get me wrong, Frida is a marvel to look at and has moments when it truly shines but it too often feels patchy or messy or, even worse, just like your conventional biopic. If you're a Kahlo fan, there's no way around this film but everybody else might be disappointed in what can only be seen as a missed opportunity.
No comments:
Post a Comment