Venus
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Movie Reviews of Venus
Movie Review: jpyo
Summary: 4 Stars
the film was excellent, why O'Toole did not get an Oscar I do not know.Movie Review: Read the full review at www.MoviePulse.net
Summary: 3 Stars
`Venus', the goddess of love represents one of human natures most basic emotions. For Maurice, an elderly British thespian played by legendary screen actor Peter O'Toole, the mythological figure stands for something far more interesting, temptation and rediscovery.
Charged with an incredible performance by O'Toole, the new film from `Notting Hill' and `Changing Lanes' director Roger Mitchell, is an intriguing piece of art, and like most artistic works, the subject matter in `Venus' is awfully hard to swallow. When Maurice's closest friend Ian is given the hospitable, or uncongenial, services of his grand-niece, a young teenager, the brash girl, and on the verge of coming of age, turns their lives upside-down.
While Jessie, played by Jodie Whittaker, is driving Ian up the wall, the young, British teen fascinates Maurice, and for an aging man, perhaps not in the most chaste of ways. What starts as seemingly an innocent friendship built by two unlikely individuals connecting at vastly different stages of their lives, quickly degrades into an objectionable sexual obsession.
In a way `Venus' mirrors Sofia Coppola's `Lost in Translation' in many ways. It opens with an actor, living off former glory, taking parts he doesn't really want to perform, and struggling with his flameless marriage. However the close, plutonic relationship that Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson developed is replaced in `Venus' by a cold and manipulative relationship shared by O'Toole and Whittaker.
O'Toole's character wants nothing more than to worship his young temptress for the goddess he envisions her as. Being young, Whittaker's character Jessie does what any teenager would do with relentless, adoring attention, abuse it. For simple sexual acts of foreplay, like the touch of the hand or a kiss on the neck, Jessie expects Maurice to buy her materialistic possessions such as diamonds and tattoos. Not exactly a fair bargain.
Eventually this seemingly simple relationship becomes seedier, and loses all emotional resonance. While O'Toole delivers a powerful, Oscar worthy performance, using his sad blue eyes to emote his pleasure and disappointment in Jessie, even he can't save what is ultimately a detached movie.
From the look of `Venus' I would have expected the picture to have been made by a relatively inexperienced director. Mitchell, who has helmed a great deal of projects, dabbles here in the handheld movement that has been sweeping the artier, independent films these days. Sadly though, aside from a few moments, the technique doesn't necessarily enhance the film, in fact in some instances it skews the framing, making the film look somewhat amateur.
Even with the unnerving plot points there are a few moments of genuine cheer, brought to life by the performances of O'Toole and his other classic British costars Leslie Phillips and Richard Griffiths, who share some amusing scenes together at their local diner. One other memorable scene is when O'Toole, in one of his more humorously perverse moments, attempts to spy on Whittaker while her character models nude for a group of artists, let's just say the sequence ends with a bang...
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Movie Review: Too Much Decrepitude
Summary: 3 Stars
The Gray Panthers, the alliance that advocates for the liberation of old people, should picket this movie. "Venus" does feature older actors in lead roles, which might be cited as an advancement of the elderly. However, all the people who are over seventy here are depicted as being profoundly and uniformly rickety. While it would be wrong to glamorize old age and gloss over the many problems attached to it - it is even worse to stereotype those over seventy as being inevitably tottering.
None of the people I know who are over seventy (or even over eighty or ninety) are as debilitated as the characters shown here, unless they are permanent residents of extended care facilities. The independently living seniors I know are generally crisply up and about.
So from the start, this movie seems to be limping painfully away from reality. First we see veteran actors Peter O'Toole and Leslie Phillips fumbling, randomly shuffling through and trading medications. That scene contains two improbabilities. First there's the improbability that two old friends in an upscale London coffee shop would be that near to collapse. Then, while seniors usually do have platoons of prescribed pills to take, I've never seen anyone randomly gulping "Two blues for three of your reds." However, I was willing to suspend disbelief and go along with this premise of muddled frailty - for a while.
But then when Vanessa Redgrave also comes dragging arthritically into the picture, barely able to gum her food - it really gets to be too much. The whole picture slows to a crawl. It assumes the unlikeliness of some fish suddenly tossed onto a stylish living room carpet and left to gasp for air. I felt that this picture was the warped projection of its younger producers'/director's fictions and fears about old age.
To be fair though, the principal young person in the film is also shown as an improbable person. When we first meet her, she's a totally sullen girl committed only to continuously slurping junk food. Most viewers will probably wonder how she's been able to keep her figure with this incessant gluttony, and might even go on to suspect that she has some compulsive eating disorder, such as some rare female version of Prader-Willi Syndrome, and that overcoming this affliction will become a secondary theme in the movie. The girl soon sheds these unpleasant traits though in the warm glow of O'Toole's fondly erotic attentions - and becomes a caring, attentive companion to O'Toole. Again, this is not too realistic.
There are some tender moments here. There is also some poignant insight into how important and sustaining the prospect of feminine beauty can be in a man's life. Along with the girl in the film, the viewer will probably wonder what vision of pleasure can sustain a woman through old age. But I don't think these moments of human connection are enough to elevate this into a first-rate picture.
The Director's commentary and the other extras on the DVD also fall rather flat.
It is worthwhile to see such distinguished actors performing. However ultimately, these super-stars are just reduced to being superannuated.
Movie Review: HAROLD AND MAUDE IN REVERSE ....AND SUBTLER
Summary: 3 Stars
You've gotta love dirty old men to enjoy something like VENUS. It certainly hits home with those in the 70 or older range who've lost their sexual physical attributes in some fashion, yet retain their psychological need for female companionship.
The freshness of Venus is that we get to see Peter O'Toole (Casanova) play an age-appropriate role and do it so well that he takes over the entire film. The downside is that there's little else to give accolades to.
Kind of a reverse Harold and Maude (1971), Venus switches the sexes and puts the age on the man and the youth on the woman. The woman is Jessie (newcomer Jodi Whittaker), the barely-out-of-her-teens niece of a friend of Maurice's (O'Toole). Maurice's buddy, Ian (Leslie Phillips), thought his niece might help take care of him, even liven up his rather dreary and mundane life. But when Jessie turns out to be an embittered and angry young woman whose only wish is to eat and drink him out of house and home, Ian runs and hides in his bedroom.
Enter Maurice who takes an instant liking to Jessie (he calls her Venus). Sexually attracted to her yet battling prostate cancer, Maurice and Venus teach each other the wiles of their ages. Maurice is a down-and-out actor who mainly plays dead or dying characters on TV programs ("Typecast again"). But he's also a lover and a married man. Like many in the film industry, his relationship with his wife is distant; so distant, in fact, that he doesn't live with her (his wife played by the esteemed and understated Vanessa Redgrave). To battle boredom, he and his friend Ian throw their many prescriptions on tables in a game to see who can find the greatest combination of pills that'll numb them out. Enjoying the female body more than he should, Maurice entices Venus to go out with him. Being bored, she accepts.
Little does Maurice know, though, that this Venus is just as dangerous as the real goddess. Don't mess with love! She learns that her new paramour is quick to lust and gradually taunts him with her desirables. Why she does this isn't quite clear, but it appears to be a way to regain her composure she lost from a previously bad relationship (one that involved a pregnancy and her forceful mother).
Although the unusual nature of their relationship is one of the more interesting aspects, it is O'Toole who, even in his advanced age (74?), carries off the dirty old man persona with equal parts disgust and longing. Whittaker (Venus/Jessie) tries hard to keep up but fails often in believability. Her line delivery often falls flat or overly-dramatic. Rarely does she hit the middle of the road, which is where O'Toole lives and breathes.
That said, this isn't a bad film to spend a night watching. It holds more interest than most movie rental dregs currently lining your Blockbuster store. And it'll make you think about what awaits you in old age, be you a man or a woman.
Movie Review: Unsettling or Uplifting? O'Toole Rises Above The Rest Of This "Venus"
Summary: 3 Stars
What's not to love about "Venus?" Just seeing Peter O'Toole command the screen in a funny and robust performance may be enough for some. And it is almost, but not quite, enough for me. O'Toole is a legend, there's no denying that--and I appreciate that he can still be at the top of his game! An odd mixture of leading man and cheeky rebel, it's hard not to be captivated by an O'Toole performance. From the classic stories of "Lawrence of Arabia" and "The Lion in Winter" (my favorite film of all time) to the fantastically underappreciated cult hits "The Stunt Man" and "The Ruling Class," O'Toole has always delivered risky and mesmerizing performances. But, in the case of "Venus," a grand performance does not necessarily make a satisfying film-going experience.
O'Toole stars as a lecherous older man (seemingly a new specialty of his), an aging actor of some renown living in meager circumstances. When his best friend, played by a terrific Leslie Phillips, invites a young woman (his niece's daughter) to stay with him--their world is turned upside down. Phillips abhors young Jessie, Jodie Whittaker, but O'Toole is enchanted. Surly, rude, and genuinely naive and nasty in equal measures--Jessie somehow challenges O'Toole as well as appeals to his manliness. In a somewhat predictable fashion, you know the two will form an unlikely bond and learn about life. But the expected pleasantness of this "uplifting" buddy romance/comedy is slightly less than comfortable when the characters exploit one another all in the name of comedy. O'Toole makes countless inappropriate advances to the girl approximately 50 years his junior (most rebuffed with a bit of slapstick abuse) and Whittaker uses the old man for anything and everything. It's really more unsettling than uplifting.
That's not to say that there aren't parts of the film I admired. I loved Phillips, who gives a great comic performance. Any time the old cronies come together, the film sparkles. I also liked the backstage glimpses of the artistic community--and the nostalgia for the theater/film world of a distant past. There is also an intriguing, if underdeveloped, subplot involving O'Toole's wife--a woman he left behind but who has become a part of his life again.
Ultimately, though, the emotional success of "Venus" depends on whether or not you care for Jessie. Is she someone you want to root for and is her evolution something that you're invested in? Sadly, for me, the answer to these questions was a resounding NO. It's not Whittaker's fault. She has some nice moments. The character, as written and portrayed, is just not someone that I found remotely appealing. I'm not saying that I have to like every movie character--but, in this case, it wouldn't have hurt. This is, after all, a touching comedy of life, love and redemption. With unpleasant Jessie at the film's heart, the movie just never connected with me. Taking nothing away from O'Toole or the other performers, I know the movie was designed to touch an emotional chord--but my cynicism never gave way to genuine feeling. KGHarris, 11/07.