Birthday Girl
|
List Price: Our Price: $3.85 You Save: $6.14 (61%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.66 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Canada
Movie Reviews of Birthday Girl
Movie Review: If Nicole Is a Femme Fatale Mail-Ordered from Russia...
Summary: 3 Stars
Suppose you are living in St. Albans, peaceful suburb of England where nothing is likely happen, and working for a small office in a bank, leading a routine life, just Ben Chaplin does in "Birthday Girl." Then, you get tired of your uneventful life, with no prospect of promotion or finding a new love around you. Ben Chaplin's character John, inspite of his better judgment, orders a Russian bride on the Internet. Her name is Nadia, who arrives at airport as beautiful Nicole Kidman (perfectly in character). Of course, John is delighted to meet her, but despite what was written on the site, Nadia cannot speak English at all. Not only that, but she starts chainsmoking in his car.
But anyway, John falls in love with Nadia, who is as sexy as Satine in Paris, but later on arrive a pair of uninvited guests from Russia (Vincent Cassel, "Crimson River"; and Matthieu Kassovitz, "Amelie") : these guys are, they claim, the old aquaintances of Nadia, who is not unhappy to meet them again. And with the arrival of those two unwelcome people, John's happy life changes into a nightmare, full of dangers and suspense.
Some sources may categorize "Birthday Girl" as thriller, but the fact is the film is more like a farce surrounding the character of John and Nadia. It has a romantic side, which is sometimes very touching, but the film itself should be called a downbeat, understated romantic comedy. There are some potentially violent elements, but director knows how to handle them with care, not letting them hinder us from appreciating the best part of the film: femme fatale image of Nicole Kidman.
As you may imagine, "Birthday Girl" is Nicole Kidman's film. Her performance as Russian girl Nadia is alone worth watching; however, which means, when she isn't on the screen, the film gets weaker even though the efforts of three good male actors. The story is often sluggish and predictable, but as long as you love the character of Nicole (or are a great fan of her), "Birthaday Girl" will be immensely interesting.
Movie Review: Has its moments.
Summary: 3 Stars
Birthday Girl (Jez Butterworth, 2001)
Butterworth's second feature film put together an exceptional cast, made the stupid in the extreme, and then dropped them all in a plot that makes swiss cheese look solid.
John (Murder by Numbers' Ben Chaplin, who should regain his cred with the star-studded Chromophobia later this year) is a bank teller looking for love. He finds it in the form of Russian mail-order bride Nadia (Nicole Kidman), at least until her cousin Yuri (Amelie's Matthieu Kassovitz) and his travelling partner Alexei (Vincent Cassel, recently in Irreversible) show up. Things get very ugly from there, though to explain how would start a chain of spoilers that would lead to you not having to see the movie.
And despite its many problems (and they are legion, the main one being why it takes John so incredibly long to make the obvious choice), Birthday Girl is a film that is at least worth seeing. Butterworth has made a very good-looking film. This will be no surprise to fans of the work of cinematographer Oliver Stapleton, who's worked on such excellent-looking (but similarly flawed) films as The Shipping News, The Van, and The Grifters. And, really, you don't have to be an expert cinematographer to make Nicole Kidman look good anyway. Still, Stapleton's gift makes the film attractive even when Kidman isn't onscreen. The leads, despite the stupidity of their characters, play their roles with vigor (Kassovitz deserves special recognition here), making the best they can of the situation they obviously found themselves in with the script, and the action sequences are wonderfully well-done, understated in a world where "action sequence" has come to equate with "lots of stuff blows up." Butterworth's take on the running guy chasing the speeding car has to be seen to be believed.
There are things to like about this movie, and things not to like about it, but it's still a decent way to turn your brain off for ninety minutes. ** ½
Movie Review: Tries to be a romantic/comedy/thriller, but fails in all 3
Summary: 3 Stars
Birthday Girl, while sporting a great performance by Nicole Kidman as a Russian mail order bride, suffers from not quite knowing what kind of film it wants to be.The plot, complete with a few twists, explores a lonely British banker's attempt to find love via a mail order bride, and his turmoil when he gets in over his head in a scam. Kidman's performance is totally believable (of course I'm no Russian, so I don't have a real knowledgeable opinion on that), and the story starts out mildly entertaining. But as the plot thickens the movie at times seem like it wants to be original before beginning to rely on overused plot devices that belong in B-movie romances and thrillers. Unfortunately, Kidman's performance isn't enough to keep the movie entertaining and the film never really manages to rise above mediocrity.
Most annoying is the way this film starts out like a romantic comedy, becomes a thriller, and goes back to romantic comedy, to dark comedy and back to thriller. It doesn't really blend them together into a cohesive form. You can combine all these genres into a good film, but Birthday Girl can't quite juggle them without dropping the ball.
The critics were right about Kidman's performance, but the reason why they focused on her and didn't comment much on the rest of the movie is clear when you watch it. It's not a bad movie, just not one to get excited about.
Movie Review: Good Actors, Weak Plot
Summary: 3 Stars
I'll first say that I thought that Nicole Kidman had an excellent Russian accent. It was interesting to see her sort of de-glamourized and looking darker and almost slutty (but she didn't really look Russian either). And Ben Chaplin was good, as were the other actors. But the plot of this movie is generally weak and sort of seemed like one of those movies that you've already seen before at some point. It's all about this lonely introverted English guy who orders a mail order bride from Russia and then she turns out to be quite different than she appears. All the acting was good but the plot seemed very forced and unrealistic at points, like it was trying to be either gritty or artistic and not really convincing at either mode. I guess in a way, this was like "Pretty Woman Gone Bad." For some reason, this movie reminded me of The Center of the World, another good but flawed movie. But The Center of the World had a much darker ending which seemed more realistic to me. If you are a Nicole Kidman fan, you'll probably rush out and rent this, otherwise, you might just wait until it shows up on cable.
Movie Review: Import A Woman!
Summary: 3 Stars
Here we go again, back to 2001, for my revisitation of the early 2000s in film!
Birthday Girl starts with Ben Chaplin, a solitary man seeking a woman. Unfortunately, he resorts to the internet for this. But having a Russian Nicole Kidman can't be too bad, can it?
Already strange, she can't speak English, which throws Chaplin off since he was informed otherwise. Humorously, he can't get anyone to address his complaints regarding this false advertising.
Nicole is fully prepared to pay for room and board, and leaps in Chaplin's pants before being asked.
Then we get some unexpected Russian company coming to visit Nicole, and soon things get very stange indeed.
The movie has some comedy, some romance and a thriller in it. Chaplin handles his performance well. There isn't too much to object to, it's just a little lacking. We get the sense that without the big stars it would feel even that much more ho-hum.