This movie makes it very hard for itself. It begins with one of the greatest events in western culture in the last two hundred years or so, and after that, well, it's just impossible.
There is a long fascination with what famous people said to each other; or how they were in affairs, and the reality is not so very gripping. This story is a putative for a start - well movies always play fast and loose with historical fact.
The two subjects are not very engaging, they are rather like wind up toys that move and speak but have nothing inside. It doesn't help that their expressions are permanently fixed and pensive. All the same the production design and photography are very satisfying and with Stravinsky as a soundtrack, it ain't all bad, but it's a bit dour and inevitable.
The best part is the opening and the night that The Rite of Spring was premiered. It's almost all accurate and it has the excitement and danger of the theater on that night with music that is still as visceral and intoxicating as ever a century later.
There is a long fascination with what famous people said to each other; or how they were in affairs, and the reality is not so very gripping. This story is a putative for a start - well movies always play fast and loose with historical fact.
The two subjects are not very engaging, they are rather like wind up toys that move and speak but have nothing inside. It doesn't help that their expressions are permanently fixed and pensive. All the same the production design and photography are very satisfying and with Stravinsky as a soundtrack, it ain't all bad, but it's a bit dour and inevitable.
The best part is the opening and the night that The Rite of Spring was premiered. It's almost all accurate and it has the excitement and danger of the theater on that night with music that is still as visceral and intoxicating as ever a century later.