Song of a Reformed Headhunter

Anthony and Cleopatra is my favorite Shakespeare play. It has the most gorgeous poetry. In the 1974 TV adaptation of an RSC production, Janet Suzman is utterly believable as Cleopatra. What she lacks in looks she more than makes up for in her mercurial sensuality. As Anthony, Richard Johnson may be less grand than I would like, but is otherwise human and persuasive. The stand-out is Patrick Stewart as Enobarbus. His betrayal of Anthony near the end, and his ultimate regret, is very moving. This TV movie, entirely shot in the studio, is directed by Jon Scoffield and produced by Trevor Nunn. Iron Jawed Angels , a 2004 HBO docudrama about the 1920s fight for the 19th Constitutional Amendment, giving women the vote, got my back up right from the start. It tries so hard to be cool. The hip music. The slangy script. The pretty faces. The Hollywood romance. The chirpy colors.  Director Katja von Garnier has little confidence in her compelling material and her MTV audience. The unfortun...

I don't understand why Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris is nominated for the Oscars unless they are all irremediable Francophile at the Academy. GH and I finally got round to watching it last night. The characters are one-dimensional, the humor weak, the pathos non-existent. You can see the plot turns coming from a mile. The message--"We all long for a Golden Age"--is hammered home mercilessly. The parade of famous writers and artists in Paris of the jazz age is relentless, a procession of cartoons. Kathy Bates as Gertrude Stein? You gotta be kidding. Owen Wilson and Rachel McAdams, the couple who find out that they are a poor match, are so blond and bland that they are like projections screens for passing vehicular headlights. Insipid.