Venus
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Movie Reviews of Venus
Movie Review: "There really isn't anything else"
Summary: 5 Stars
And so reflects 70-something Maurice (Peter O'Toole) about the importance of beauty and searching for love as the only significant goals as life races by him. VENUS is a small miracle of a film written by Hanif Kureishi ('My Beautiful Laundrette') about the isolation and inner devastation of growing old in today's society. What could have been a morose, whining diatribe about the cruelties of advancing age and the manner in which we treat the elderly becomes a window into the psyche of older characters whose lives have meant something - if to no one else but themselves.
Three old thespian friends and colleagues (Maurice, Ian - Leslie Phillips and Donald - Richard Griffiths) spend their days reading obits, sharing pills and recalling the days of their acting glory. Maurice has not given up as he still performs as old characters in films and continues his lifelong libidinous longing for beautiful females. Ian fears death from hypertension and agrees to have his niece's daughter Jessie (Jodie Whittaker) move in to care for him. But the coarse, crude, and rude Jessie drives Ian to distraction and Ian seeks Maurice's aid in diverting Jessie's time to activity away from her home care service. The story thus opens the way to examine the needs and desires of both Maurice and the very young Jessie, each finding a sense of solace, friendship and a new kind of love despite their extreme age differences. Maurice continues to visit his ex-wife Valerie (Vanessa Redgrave) whenever he needs a connection to reality: these encounters speak more about the continuity of love once splintered than in almost any prior film.
In a story that could have focused on aged lechery and youthful opportunism this film, as directed by Roger Michell, instead elects to find the path toward beauty that underlines the needs of disparate people. The performance by O'Toole is staggeringly superb and the remainder of this small cast (Redgrave, Griffiths, Phillips - all long admired, seasoned pros - and Whittaker, a very promising new face) is top notch. The writing and directing and acting in this film is at the peak of excellence - there really isn't anything else. Grady Harp, May 07
Movie Review: Imagine that! The Elderly actually have feelings...and wisdom
Summary: 5 Stars
I guess there are all kinds of ways people approach their winter years. You can resign yourself to the inevitable, or you can go out kicking and screaming "Boy, What a Ride" ! Seldom has getting older been so fresh and compellingly portrayed, from various points of view. The physical restrictions of aging are well-examined, but there's a futility, masked by lots of humor, that held my interest. Certainly, Peter O'Toole proved that he's still got the moxy and charm. He's always been a selfish, cunning old fart who always got his way, but the prospect of facing prostate cancer makes him rev up his engine to prove to himself that he's got a lot of miles to go. The wonderful Leslie Phillips (not the one you may think) came out of semi-retirement to personify the role of O'Toole's best old buddy. There's also some brief appearances by the wonderful Richard Griffiths, a sort of sense of reason among the goofy goings on. The object of this "coming of age" is the appearance of Phillips' young relative, whom he hopes will take care of him. Of course, young people "know everything", and she has different plans. Her very individualism sparks an interest in O'Toole, and here we have the scenario. Jodie Whittaker is excellent as the young, smart-mouthed tart, and O'Toole uses all ends of smarm & charm to win her over. Their scenes together are memorable. Matching O'Toole in every scene is Vanessa Redgrave, the cast-aside wife of yore, whose dignity and resignation to her fate has left her lonely, but never bitter. Wonderful! Certainly, this small budget gem will not blow anyone away with innovations in film-making. What it has is a moving script and sensitive direction from Roger Michel. Old folks have been given respect in other films like "Cocoon", "Space Cowboys" and that hilarious film about the old guys who rob a bank (the title of which escapes me). If you ask me, there's a lot to be said about aging that has been untapped. Is it because everyone's looking for lots of explosions and super-heroes, etc? We need more films like "Venus", if only to examine the amazing and interesting...and FUN...stories that can be told.Movie Review: Funny and moving
Summary: 5 Stars
Maurice (Peter O'Toole) is an aging British actor who falls for his best friend's niece, Jessie. Jessie ends up being a total party girl, unlike anything Maurice, nor her uncle ever expected. She drinks all of her Uncle Ian's alcohol, cusses at him, she's rude, and she just plain hates the man.
One day Maurice realizes that he is in love with the girl. Jessie is about eighteen, while Maurice is going on eighty. He begins to buy her stuff, and takes her out on the town in a rented limo. He also takes her to see the painting, Venus at the London museum. Maurice tells Jessie that she is Venus, and he begins to call her by that name.
One day Jessie brings her boyfriend over to Maurice's house. Let's just say all hell breaks loose after that!
This is quite a good story, it's not exactly like I thought it would be. Since this is a British movie, there are parts that I didn't understand. I guess I'm not that cultured...yet.
Peter O' Toole is simply amazing in this movie! In my opinion he is playing himself, an aging actor.
Also, I have two favourite scenes in this movie. The first one has to be when Maurice gets Jessie a modeling job. Everything goes fine until Jessie learns it's nude modeling and Maurice wants to watch! The art teacher makes Maurice leave, but that doesn't stop him from peeking over the door, which results in a hilarious Larry David moment.
The other scene has to be when Jessie is trying on some new earrings that Maurice bought for her. She is wearing nothing but her underwear because by now Jessie has realized that Maurice has a crush on her, and she thinks it's funny to tease him. Maurice goes and slips his hand over her bra, and begins to feel her breast, then Jessie does a karate jab into his rib, while saying, "Maurice you had it coming!"
Anyway, you come away from the movie with I think a better understanding of the world around you, and no matter how old you're, you can still have tons of fun.
Oh, Peter O' Toole was robbed out of an Oscar for this role.
Movie Review: How Not to Go Quietly
Summary: 5 Stars
If you are just a little bit lucky in life and in love someone will think of you as a "Venus" or a "David" (as in Michelangelo). And for better or worse Maurice (a terrific, sensitive, thoughtful performance by Peter O'Toole) feels this way about a young woman Jessie (Jodie Whittaker in a strong debut). And though at first Jessie resists the friendship and mentorship of Maurice she soon realizes that this man who offers his love and companionship, wants her in as selfless a manner as possible. Maurice is attracted to the youth, vigor and life in Jessie and she is attracted to his just slightly more than platonic attraction to her. Both Maurice and Jesse have agendas but they are not hidden as is usually the case in this type of lopsided relationship. Both are unabashedly upfront and without pretense.
Director Roger Michell and particularly writer Hanif Kureishi ("My Beautiful Launderette") are tackling some important ideas here: slightly more advanced platonic love (oddly stated but nothing is really clear-cut in this film), how we as a society tend to discard the over 60 generation, the possibility of physical love after 60 or 70 , how the fervent and physical love between young people often matures into deep friendship and respect but sometimes doesn't and more importantly how our friends can ease our path into old age.
Of special note here are the wonderful scenes between O'Toole and Vanessa Redgrave as his ex-wife and mother of his children. There is a palpable longing and regret in these scenes: these two know each other as no one else does and despite this they love each other with that special kind of love reserved for people who have seen and experienced each other's worst self.
"Venus" is a remarkable film about loss, love and about the possibilities of life after 40...if not 60, 70 and 80. Maurice adamantly refuses to "go gently into that good night" without a fight, a slug of Scotch, a bracing cup of Tea and a knowing wink to a pretty girl.
Movie Review: The tantalizing feminine alluring!
Summary: 5 Stars
Venus is an emblematic movie that deals with the human condition of a respectable actor, beloved and loved by many women in the past who lives on the verge of the forgetfulness, isolated and imprisoned between his memories (Like Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard) ; nevertheless Maurice is still an avid observer of the human condition and from time to time makes secondary roles.
The arrival of a provincial and alluring young woman, who comes for the first time in her life to London, niece of his best friend, will arouse for both of them new horizons of unsuspected consequences, she is the unreachable muse for him but he has the spelling magic of the word; once more the wisdom and experience face with the missing energies of an unbridled youth that is aware it has all the time of the world for acting and mistaking, on the other side of the street, Maurice is well conscious the time is a no removable resource and enjoys every single moment of his existence, due a painful prostrate cancer may annihilate him in any moment.
However, the approach of the film is far to be tragic; on the contrary, it's a celebration of life a song for these splendid and irreversible moments that must be lived with Dionysian intensity, no matter what the rest of the world think.
Peter O`Toole gives an astonishing and vivid performance as the dying actor; and Roger Mitchell shows us his skills and superb god taste behind the camera, who works out as a peeping tom; needless to say as an extension of Maurice's personality.
There are flashes of the last film of Don Luis Bunuel "That obscure object of desire" , but the film will preserve itself as a cult movie for the future viewers.