Period romances can’t fall back on explicit set pieces or modern courtship rituals to make audiences fall for them.
It takes chemistry of the first order and screenwriting that make the lovers’ passions palpable to all.
“Bright Star,” based on the final years of Romantic poet John Keats, fails in both measures. That doesn’t mean it lacks potent lead performances or pinpoint period detail.
But Keats’ celebrated love poetry can’t salvage a romance in which the dramatic tension melts away mid-film.
“Bright Star” casts Abbie Cornish as Fanny Brawne, a seamstress whose affluent lifestyle allows her to meet a struggling young poet named John Keats (Ben Whishaw).
She doesn’t particularly like Mr. Keats’ work, as she calls him, but there’s something about his humble approach to both his poetry and his lifestyle which draws her in.
He responds, but only fitfully. He knows he isn’t rich enough to be a proper match for her, and just when his poetry career seems ready to ascend he comes down with a serious illness.
“Bright Star” can’t help but fall into the traps laid out by the genre. The two read poetry together, spend afternoons strolling through the wooded land around Fanny’s estate and swap heavy glances ripe with significance.
Both Cornish and Whishaw transcend such banal moments. Cornish makes Fanny a spirited heroine, one who doesn’t adopt 21st century mannerisms but still fights for love on her own terms. And Whishaw is neither petulant nor fully agreeable as Keats. He’s simply a man aching to share his musings with the world, even if people aren’t quite ready to honor his work just yet.
Once the pair start accepting their emotions the film becomes unsure what to reveal next. Keats’ bullying partner, Charles Brown (Paul Schneider), offers some emotional friction. But no one else in the sparse cast leaves a similarly sharp impression.
Writer/director Jane Campion (”The Piano”) fails to connect the couple’s romantic pining with Keats’ deteriorating condition.
“Bright Star” is a handsomely mounted romance, but one in which the heart strings aren’t so much plucked as nudged until only a few minor notes can be heard.
(Photo: Ben Whishaw and Abbie Cornish can’t seem to get their romance on track in the new period drama “Bright Star.” Courtesy of Apparition Films)
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I'm an award-winning journalist and film critic with more than a decade of experience in newspapers, magazines and the Web. I'm a member of both the Washington, DC Area Film Critics Association and the Denver Film Critics Society.
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I couldn’t agree more. This was a very average movie (and I was hoping for so much more).
Young love, while sweet, can also be a bit laborious. They could have shaved a good 20 minutes off this film without losing the sentiment.
Note about historical accuracy: After brief research, it appears “Bright Star” is fairly historically correct, however, there’s one point I’d like to make regarding the film’s accuracy. The story leads the audience to believe Fanny Brawne “walked the heath” for the rest of her life, pining for her lost love. This is not true. Fanny Brawne went on to marry and have three children.
Leave it to Hollywood to tangle the truth just enough to leave the young girls heartbroken and in dispair, sort of like Bella the blubbering vampire-lover. Gag.