Sundance Training part 4 - "The Painted Veil" some spoiling

Mmmm Edward Norton and Naomi Watts... Eye candy for everyone...
Despite the distraction of beautiful and talented leading actors, "The Painted Veil," based on the 1925 novel by W. Somerset Maughan, is a beautiful film. Set in the Chinese equivalent of the end of the British Raj in India, the nationalist upheaval which led to the Maoist revolution is just beginning. There are riots over how European and American businesses treat their Chinese employees and lots of anti-foreign agitating. There is also heat, disease and boredom for a society girl married to an infectious disease researcher.
Dr. Walter Fane (Norton), a young English medical researcher in Shanghai, meets, falls in love with and marries Kitty (Watts) on a trip to London. He marries her for love, she marries him to get as far away as possible from her dominating mother.
When they arrive in Shanghai, Walter is a bit embarrassed by his home, but promises Kitty that he will do whatever he can to make her happy.
The potential SPOILER BIT STARTS HERE and goes four paragraphs.
This includes ignoring her affair with Charlie Townsend (Liev Schreiber at his sleaziest).
When Walter reaches his breaking point he volunteers to go to an inland town which is suffering a cholera outbreak. He tells Kitty she can either go with him or that he will divorce her if Townsend divorces his wife and agrees to marry her.
Walter makes the trip inland as uncomfortable and long as possible for Kitty.
Through the eyes of the French Nuns who run the orphanage and hospital, Waddington (Toby Jones) who I believe is the British Counsel for the region (sorry I've forgotten his title), and Walter's own devoted work as a clinician for the first time in his career, Kitty learns to love Walter. He also comes to forgive her based on her own selfless actions during the epidemic. Alas, this mutual love in their marriage is too late, as cholera conquers love.
END OF SPOILER
This movie ends badly and well as 1920's novels so often do.
Kitty is a better person at the end of the film. Her personal growth may seem a bit rushed, but the movie is so well made it is easy to imagine the long days and longer nights of the epidemic.
Naomi Watts, like Helen Mirren in "The Queen", deserves an Oscar nomination for her role as Kitty. Though I still think that Mirren deserves to win.
Norton's performance is as good as I've seen this year and one of his finest since "American History X." I really liked "The Illusionist" at Sundance last year, and think this is better. Norton has found an unlikely niche in first quarter of the 20th century period pieces.

Movie -- "Little Children" Sundance Training part 3

Despite an 83% positive rating on rottentomatoes.com, "Little Children" didn't do that much for me when I ventured out to the flicks last night.
Kate Winslet is beautiful as Sarah Pierce, as are Patrick Wilson as Brad Adamson and Jennifer Connelly in a supporting role as Brad's wife Kathy. The two children are charming, and act like kids. I was just left cold.
The movie starts well, I was taken with the characters and their sudden passions. I understood the well educated Sarah's loathing of the suburban mother's around her who seemed to have no ambition beyond being the cattiest women in the neighborhood. I appreciated Brad's desire not to pass the bar exam. The fact that their needs to break free coincided made for a potentially wonderful tale.
The subplot about the return of convicted exhibitionist Ronnie J. McGorvey (Jackie Earle Haley) to his mother's home and his subsequent persecution by former cop Larry Hedges (Noah Emmerich) doesn't seem to fit until the end of the movie. It doesn't serve to tie Sarah and Brad together or move forward any other aspect of the plot.
The scene in the movie which amused me the most was the one at the book club, when Sarah's walking partner/baby sitter dragged her along as her "little sister" to discuss Madam Bovary. The other "little sister" there was Mary Ann (Mary B. McCann) the queen bee of the moms at the playground. Anyway the discussion of Madam Bovary was funny, if a bit obvious in relation to the movie.
By the last 45 minutes I was checking my watch. I was tired of Sarah and Brad, though I was finally starting to be interested in the relationship between Ronnie and Larry.
I think if I'd been reading the novel I'd have been fine with the ending, but I like my movie magic and hated to see this ending on film.
And to the projectionist at the Broadway, your undeleted expletive when you were starting the trailers was loud and clear in the auditorium.

Sundance Training part 2

So instead of watching all of the BCS championship game last evening, I decided to hit the flicks.
I remember reading Perfume by Patrick Sueskind years ago. I remember it as being very odd, somewhat disturbing and a real strain to read. It took me a long time for a relatively short book.
So, of course, I had to catch the film.
First things first, this book translated to film very well.
"Perfume: The Story of a Murderer" is the story of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Wishaw), born to a fish seller, sent to an orphanage and sold as the apprentice to a tanner before becoming an apprentice perfumer. Jean-Baptiste has a perfect sense of smell, he impresses his down-on-his-luck perfumer master Giuseppe Baldini (Dustin Hoffman) by recreating a popular perfume and then improving it. Jean-Baptiste wants, however, to learn to preserve every smell - and finds out that Baldini does not have all of the answers he needs.
In exchange for 100 perfume recipes Baldini gives Jean-Baptiste journeyman's papers so that he can travel to Grasse to learn more. In his travels, Jean-Baptiste finds a cave with close to no odor, the most comforting thing he's ever found, it is there, however, that he discovers his own lack of personal scent. This lack explains the sometimes hostile reactions people have had to him since he was a baby. It also explains how, when he moves quietly, he is all but invisible to people around him.
This movie is, as titled, "The Story of a Murderer." Though not all of the deaths in the film are murders, people around Jean-Baptiste seem to die starting with his mother. Some are set upon by cutpurses, others have fluke accidents, but nearly everyone who is somehow important in his life, for good or ill, suffers an unnatural death.
There are at least 19 untimely deaths in this film, but it manages not to be gorey. It is violent and dark, but there is very little blood.
The film is also full of beautiful women (most of whom die) who have very little dialogue but each has some personality even if she is on screen for fewer than 30 seconds. These women are important to the story, but because Jean-Baptiste is lacking in the most basic social skills even prostitutes become distant objects whom he cannot interact with in any normal way.
Like the book the movie "Perfume" is not easy, but it's worth the effort.
Spellcheck hates me again today, so sorry if I've missed any errors.

Sundance preliminary schedule

If the gods smile and all goes well, I'm going to hit 31 movies at Sundance this year. These are all at Salt Lake City venues.
Here's my tentative schedule:
Friday
X: The Unheard Music
Ghosts
Saturday
Shorts Program 1
Animation Spotlight
Red Road
Teeth
Fido
Sunday
Crazy Love
Chicago 10
Broken English
Joe Strummer
Monday
Interview
A Very British Gangster
Tuesday
Once
Delirious
Wednesday
Summer Rain
Grace Is Gone
Thursday
The Monastery
Angel-A
Friday
Ezra
On the Road with Judas
Smiley Face
Saturday
Three Comrades
Welcome Europa
Tuli
The Good Night
Black Snake Moan
Year of the Fish
Sunday
Life Support
The Nines
Eagle vs. Shark