I watched Girl with a Pearl Earring last night (for the second or third time) with one of my classes. The movie has a lot of strengths.
For one thing, and perhaps most importantly, despite being a practically dialogue-free movie (that's an exaggeration, but it is, to say the least, hardly a gabfest), it is never boring. This is probably due to the movie's other two biggest boons: its fantastic lead actress and its cinematography. Scarlett Johansson is incredible in this film, full of unspoken nuance (though I still think those who say she's better here than in Lost in Translation are nuts), fascinating even before she was the major star she is today. Secondly, the cinematography is UHHHMAZING. Maybe because I'm an Art History major, but I can't help but be crazy for a movie when every shot looks like a Vermeer painting, through its use of light and compositions. It's the best cinematographic job of the new decade.
Still, the film does have its flaws. Every character save Griet seems to be kind of one-dimensional or be there only as a plot point (and it might only be by the grace of Scarlett that Griet is not). I'm all for unsympathetic characters, but the extreme bile that the screenwriter and director create toward Vermeer's daughter (and his wife and patron, but to a lesser extent) is excessive, and pointless.
Nevertheless, it is a smart, respectable, and GORGEOUS movie. B+, #7 of 2003
For one thing, and perhaps most importantly, despite being a practically dialogue-free movie (that's an exaggeration, but it is, to say the least, hardly a gabfest), it is never boring. This is probably due to the movie's other two biggest boons: its fantastic lead actress and its cinematography. Scarlett Johansson is incredible in this film, full of unspoken nuance (though I still think those who say she's better here than in Lost in Translation are nuts), fascinating even before she was the major star she is today. Secondly, the cinematography is UHHHMAZING. Maybe because I'm an Art History major, but I can't help but be crazy for a movie when every shot looks like a Vermeer painting, through its use of light and compositions. It's the best cinematographic job of the new decade.
Still, the film does have its flaws. Every character save Griet seems to be kind of one-dimensional or be there only as a plot point (and it might only be by the grace of Scarlett that Griet is not). I'm all for unsympathetic characters, but the extreme bile that the screenwriter and director create toward Vermeer's daughter (and his wife and patron, but to a lesser extent) is excessive, and pointless.
Nevertheless, it is a smart, respectable, and GORGEOUS movie. B+, #7 of 2003
