...for stuff like this any more. I had quite high hopes for this movie when I ordered it from Netflix. It seemed like a modestly interesting story premise (romance and politics), and I really liked Kelly Macdonald (Gina) in Trainspotting and positively loved her in Gosford Park, one of my all time favorite movies. She's a terrific and under-rated actress. I like Bill Nighy too (Lawrence). In recent years he's been impressive in both The Constant Gardener and Love Actually and many, many other projects, too numerous to mention. He made a pretty good Slartibartfast in Hitch Hikers' Guide to the Galaxy too. In fact, he was the best thing in that movie.
Girl in the Cafe had been quite well reviewed, but I can only conclude the reviewer was watching something different to me. Or perhaps the reviewer was just an old guy, harboring that old illusion that what nubile young women with delightful bodies really hanker after is scruffy old men. Hmmmmm. I hate to sound cruel, but I can't say I felt that way myself when I was twenty something. But then I guess I'm just shallow and superficial. Or perhaps I wasn't delightful enough? I'm sorry, but this movie just brought out the complete cynic in me.
The story is pretty ridiculous given the security traumas the major world powers have been going through since 9/11, and the paranoia that has ensued. A high ranking British civil servant is allowed to take, at the last minute, a totally unknown young woman (who we later learn has a criminal record) to a G8 summit in Iceland where she will mix with the politicians and have full access to the hotel where they are all staying. I'd have thought that warranted one of Bush's Orange Alerts at the very least. He is some kind of statistician with depression, and she is someone who hangs around in cafés near Westminster. At the summit, at a high profile dinner party, she needles the conscience of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, and subsequently the old world order is overturned leading to an immediate reduction in world poverty and, one hopes, a total cessation of the need for G8 summits. Or something. Thereby achieving with a few simple questions what Bono has failed to achieve by ear-holing every world leader he can catch in a leg hold trap.
It's all pretty silly, but this is presented with a straight face. At best it is naive and delusional. At worst it is pretentious. But what really had me reaching for the gin, was the romance between these two unlikely passion kittens. Call it middle aged jealousy if you must, but personally I'd just love to see it recast with Maggie Smith as the statistician and the perfectly formed Josh Hartnett as the nubile young thing. And like Macdonald, he could take off his shirt for our delectation, before clambering into bed to do his bit for the anti globalization movement. One recent comparison for Girl in the Cafe, is this year's excellent Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont. That too deals with an older person and a younger person of opposite genders finding common ground and some solace in each other's company. But we weren't asked to believe that Rupert Friend was overcome with lust for Joan Plowright. Thank God. (And yes I do appreciate that Joan Plowright is a trifle older than Bill Nighy.)
Do not, under any circumstances, watch this movie sober. I did, and regretted it.
Addendum: a friend has suggested that I missed something vital because the girl was a plant, and basically Bill Nighy's character was a sad sack who was suckered. Maybe I did indeed miss something vital (blurred vision after all that gin?), but all of the above stands. High ranking civil servant allowed to take complete stranger with criminal record to G8 summit? I don't think so. A simplistic attempt at world politics that fails.
Girl in the Cafe had been quite well reviewed, but I can only conclude the reviewer was watching something different to me. Or perhaps the reviewer was just an old guy, harboring that old illusion that what nubile young women with delightful bodies really hanker after is scruffy old men. Hmmmmm. I hate to sound cruel, but I can't say I felt that way myself when I was twenty something. But then I guess I'm just shallow and superficial. Or perhaps I wasn't delightful enough? I'm sorry, but this movie just brought out the complete cynic in me.
The story is pretty ridiculous given the security traumas the major world powers have been going through since 9/11, and the paranoia that has ensued. A high ranking British civil servant is allowed to take, at the last minute, a totally unknown young woman (who we later learn has a criminal record) to a G8 summit in Iceland where she will mix with the politicians and have full access to the hotel where they are all staying. I'd have thought that warranted one of Bush's Orange Alerts at the very least. He is some kind of statistician with depression, and she is someone who hangs around in cafés near Westminster. At the summit, at a high profile dinner party, she needles the conscience of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, and subsequently the old world order is overturned leading to an immediate reduction in world poverty and, one hopes, a total cessation of the need for G8 summits. Or something. Thereby achieving with a few simple questions what Bono has failed to achieve by ear-holing every world leader he can catch in a leg hold trap.
It's all pretty silly, but this is presented with a straight face. At best it is naive and delusional. At worst it is pretentious. But what really had me reaching for the gin, was the romance between these two unlikely passion kittens. Call it middle aged jealousy if you must, but personally I'd just love to see it recast with Maggie Smith as the statistician and the perfectly formed Josh Hartnett as the nubile young thing. And like Macdonald, he could take off his shirt for our delectation, before clambering into bed to do his bit for the anti globalization movement. One recent comparison for Girl in the Cafe, is this year's excellent Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont. That too deals with an older person and a younger person of opposite genders finding common ground and some solace in each other's company. But we weren't asked to believe that Rupert Friend was overcome with lust for Joan Plowright. Thank God. (And yes I do appreciate that Joan Plowright is a trifle older than Bill Nighy.)
Do not, under any circumstances, watch this movie sober. I did, and regretted it.
Addendum: a friend has suggested that I missed something vital because the girl was a plant, and basically Bill Nighy's character was a sad sack who was suckered. Maybe I did indeed miss something vital (blurred vision after all that gin?), but all of the above stands. High ranking civil servant allowed to take complete stranger with criminal record to G8 summit? I don't think so. A simplistic attempt at world politics that fails.