Finally got around to watching The Libertine last night, and I thought it was rotten.
Directed by a guy who normally designs album covers and makes car adverts, doing his first film, and it shows.
He was clearly put in place as a yes-man by Malkovich and Depp, for whom this was a vanity project in which he's allowed to do his autopilot Johnny Depp thing (complete with that trademark quick sarcastic smirk), unguided and undirected.
There was no hint as to why John Wilmot/Earl Of Rochester became this jaded, debauched, wisecracking monster. He just is, so we watch his inevitable decline without any sense of involvement.
Despite all the shagging and duplicity and murder, the whole thing felt totally flat. No moments of gripping drama or high emotion. Just some well-known actors in funny 17th century wigs arsing around for a couple of hours.
And I'm not entirely sure that the conceit of mixing standard Olde English syntax with modern-day slang ("What the fuck?", "For fuck's sake" etc) worked.
(And I like Johnny Depp, by the way.)
Directed by a guy who normally designs album covers and makes car adverts, doing his first film, and it shows.
He was clearly put in place as a yes-man by Malkovich and Depp, for whom this was a vanity project in which he's allowed to do his autopilot Johnny Depp thing (complete with that trademark quick sarcastic smirk), unguided and undirected.
There was no hint as to why John Wilmot/Earl Of Rochester became this jaded, debauched, wisecracking monster. He just is, so we watch his inevitable decline without any sense of involvement.
Despite all the shagging and duplicity and murder, the whole thing felt totally flat. No moments of gripping drama or high emotion. Just some well-known actors in funny 17th century wigs arsing around for a couple of hours.
And I'm not entirely sure that the conceit of mixing standard Olde English syntax with modern-day slang ("What the fuck?", "For fuck's sake" etc) worked.
(And I like Johnny Depp, by the way.)