DVDebut: Asif Kapadia/Christopher Hampton's featherweight but very pretty ALI AND NINO

A movie that has much in common with last week's offering, The Ottoman Lieutenant -- same time period (World War I) and same location (the middle east) -- ALI & NINO, from that very up-and-down director, Asif Kapadia, and similar screenwriter Christopher Hampton, has all the markings of a work-for-hire done by people who were not especially enamored by their subject matter but labored dutifully and professionally to produce a decent product.

They have, and at only 100 minutes, the movie is not difficult to sit through. Visually, in fact, it is quite a treat, what with its gorgeous interiors (homes/palaces of the uber-wealthy) and exteriors (it was filmed in Azerbaijan and Turkey in some pretty spectacular locales). But the writing by Mr. Hampton is merely workmanlike, telling its story pretty much as expected, while the direction by Mr. Kapadia (shown at right) is of the same ilk.

The two leads are played by Palestinian actor Adam Bakri (above, right) and Spanish actress Maria Valverde (above, left). Both are charming, attractive and play well together. Though limited by what they were given to do and say, they acquit themselves professionally. As does much of the oddly starry and underused supporting cast, led by Mandy Patinkin (below) and Connie Nielsen and Nino's parents, with the standout performance given by Italian actor Riccardo Scamarcio (at bottom, right), playing the rather quickly dispatched villain of the piece. He's hissable and more.

A lot of incident is packed into the movie's running time, and as this piles up, it simultaneously seems to somehow lessen in importance, even though it deals with issues like life and death and love. But we've seen it all before, even if not perhaps in such picturesque locations.

From IFC Films and after a very limited and don't-blink-or-you'll-miss-it theatrical release, the movie hits DVD this Tuesday, March 21 -- for purchase and/or rental. 

History, romance, genocide: Joseph Ruben & John Stockwell's THE OTTOMAN LIEUTENANT

Both old-fashioned and up-to-the-minute, THE OTTOMAN LIEUTENANT is a historical romance that manages to be relatively compelling, despite -- even perhaps because of -- its rather standard-issue filmmaking, including adequate direction (by Joseph Ruben) and by-the-numbers scripting (from Jeff Stockwell). And yet, because the locale is so sumptuous -- the movie was filmed in both Turkey and the Czech Republic -- and the tale told here one of love and sacrifice in wartime, the movie is difficult not to enjoy for its visuals & story.

Mr. Ruben has proven himself a journeyman filmmaker over the past forty-odd years (his biggest critical hit was probably The Stepfather; his box-office hit, Sleeping With the Enemy), and he does a creditable job here, as well. His international cast is well-chosen, with romantic leads played by actors relatively new to me (since I don't watch that much television): Michiel Huisman (below, left) in the title role, and Hera Hilmar (below, right) as the young Philadelphia woman who forsakes America and its racist institutions (she works in a hospital where a black man dies because the administration refuses to let him be cared for) to light out for Turkey and a hospital in the hinterlands run by Josh Hartnett.

What makes the movie seem ever relevant and current -- even though it takes place just prior to and during World War I -- is the fact that it puts us in the center of what will soon become in horrific Armenian genocide perpetrated by the Turks, for which, even now, the country refuses to take responsibility. We are spared the kind of mass killing and horror we've seen in other films (Ararat, for one), but we cannot escape the fact that this is happening. (The Muslim Ottoman Empire aligned with Germany in World War I, while the Armenian Christians sided with the Allies -- including England, France and Russia -- adding to the build-up of hatred that would encourage more of the ongoing genocide.)

Huisman's lieutenant turns out to be a "good Turk" who protects the Armenians, while the hospital in which Hilmar, Hartnett (above) and Ben Kingsley (below, center, playing another drug-addicted doctor with a sad backstory of his own) all labor, refuses to take sides, treating and caring for the wounded, whatever their uniform. Romantic conflict ensues when both the young men's desire for Hilmar's character comes to the fore, and a rather good fight between the two men takes place.

Love, sex, and a suicide mission involving detonating a fortress full of ammunition all occur, along with death, destruction, and a loss of friends, lovers and entire families. A horseback ride lets loose some freedom and passion, and in one of the movie's best moments, a combination of sexual attraction and mutual respect leads to a very nice and unusual near-love scene that's unusual in the annals of cinema.

All in all, The Ottoman Lieutenant proves quite watchable, even if it never loses its been-there/seen-that sheen. From Paladin and running a just-about-right 110 minutes, the movie opens today all around the country. Here in South Florida you can catch it in Miami at the AMC Sunset Place 24 and the Regal South Beach Stadium 18; in Fort Lauderdale at the AMC Pompano 18 (formerly Broward 18), the Regal Oakwood 18, the Regal Sawgrass Stadium 23, and the Regal Cypress Creek Stadium 16; in Palm Beach at the AMC Parisian 20; at the Regal Shadowood 16, in Boca Raton; at the Regal Royal Palm Beach Stadium 18, and the Indian River 24 in Vero Beach. 

Blu-ray/DVD/Digital Download debut: Tom Hooper/Lucinda Coxon's THE DANISH GIRL

One of this past year's juiciest piece of "Oscar" bait, THE DANISH GIRL proved a relatively successful arthouse hit with audiences, even if many critics found the film wanting. TrustMovies is only catching up with the movie now, upon its video and streaming debut, but he can readily understand both how it turned heads and left something less than a fresh taste in certain mouths. Speaking of taste, the movie is every bit as tasteful as we would expect from Tom Hooper, the director who gave us Oscar winner, The King's Speech, and the filmed version of Les Miz.

Mr. Hooper (shown at right) and his screenwriter, Lucinda Coxon (shown below, who based her writing on the book by David Ebershoff), do their best work early on in telling this very "inspired-by" tale of one of the world's first transgendered women. That would be Einar Wegener -- who became Lili Elbe -- aided by his supportive and hugely long-suffering wife, Gerda Wegener. Both spouses are artists (he of landscapes, she of portraits), and both are talented and (eventually, in her case) successful. Exactly how much of this "story" is actually true I

couldn't begin to vouch for, but it is told in the manner of so many of Hollywood's highly tasteful and lovely-to-look-at historical bio-pics. So it's an easy watch. For awhile. The movie captures our attention via the lead performance of that very fine actor Eddie Redmayne, shown below, who plays Einar/Lili and is quite adept is showing us how this young husband is initially captivated by women and their clothing, and then, once his wife has persuaded him to pose in those clothes so that she can finish a painting, is quickly drawn first into cross-dressing and eventually into the all-out desire and need to become a woman.

Mr Redmayne and Alicia Vikander (below), who plays his wife, are both superb at keeping us alert, watchful and entertained, as well as making us believe that they are indeed soul-mates. The details of the couple's life together and their careers go some distance in making the first half of the film as compelling as it is.

Once Einar begins to get Lili-fied, however, either Ms Coxon did not have enough specifics to draw from or Mr Hooper could not bring these to much life because the movie soon begins to deal mostly in the obvious and the cliched.

As Lili engages in flirtation with an admirer (Ben Whishaw) and is reunited with an old friend and schoolmate (Matthias Schoenaerts, below) who soon bonds with Gerda, the filmmakers seem reduced to too much vamping -- dragging the film out to to fill the two-hour running time.

Yes, we understand how difficult it was back in that even-more-patriarchal-day for a man to relinquish his maleness, but instead of offering up some thoughtful ideas and intelligent dialog, the film instead is content with mostly standard stuff.

Still, this is quite a beautiful movie to look at; the cast is competent and often much more, and the subject is as timely as Caitlyn Jenner (and certainly more interesting than anything I've yet seen or read about her).  

From Focus Features and running 120 minutes, The Danish Girl has been available for digital download since February 16 and will make its DVD and Blu-ray (the transfer to the latter is excellent) this coming Tuesday, March 1 -- for purchase or rental.

Lee Liberman's streaming tip -- Duff/Hardy in Milne/Giedroyc's ELIZABETH I: VIRGIN QUEEN

This emotionally absorbing version of the life of Elizabeth I (BBC/PBS Boston, 2005) begs attention to its lead, distinguished British actress Anne-Marie Duff. Among her many credits, Duff starred in Shameless (series streaming on Netflix); had a supporting role as a whiney social-climber in the BBC2/HBO mini-series, Parade's End; and she just ended a run at NYC's Lincoln Center as a glamorous Lady MacBeth opposite Ethan Hawke's MacBeth.

In Elizabeth I: the Virgin Queen, Duff (shown at left) dazzles and convinces compared to other Elizabeth's -- more so than Glenda Jackson, Cate Blanchett, or Helen Mirren, for instance. Although credit or debit goes to the actor, the writing is all important, Duff has said; her Queen is a brilliant living creation rather than a scripted historical figure. Some find Duff histrionic but her view of her job is to embrace the truth of each person she plays -- likeable or not. Here, she dazzles while being difficult and appearing plain.

This re-imagining of Elizabeth's gleaming tenure hangs on a love story -- that of her intense relationship with childhood friend and advisor, Robert Dudley -- rather than on an orderly chronology of events. Major events reveal her personality -- the shrewd, coy, jealous, manipulative, vain, and absolutely devoted head of state. One running theme is her advisors' dogged efforts to get her to marry. Elizabeth used those years to improve her domination over the male power structure by pitting suitors and courtiers against each other for her favor, gradually creating a cult of personality as "Virgin Queen" married to her people. This circumvented her privy council's marriage imperative while also providing a steady diet of the adoration she must have craved as Henry VIII's out-of-favor child. Above all she sabotaged any effort to interfere with her supremacy ("I will have no man rule over me").

One reviewer called the production "a hodge-podge treatise on sexual frustration", but Elizabeth had plenty of motive to avoid marriage, her father having decapitated her mother, Anne Boleyn, and set upon her many step-mothers. Her defensive armor against marriage "comes at the price of a cold bed', warned Dudley, who wanted to marry her and whom she dangled for years even though she loved him. Played by a seductive Tom Hardy (at right and further above), Dudley stayed at her side during his two marriages until his death, leaving Elizabeth bereft and miserable. (His role as Dudley was a star turn for Hardy, who lately fills his dance card in Hollywood blockbuster and B-list movie parts.)

But as attractive as Tom Hardy's Dudley, the production sells short the real Robert Dudley, writing him as a boy-toy whom Elizabeth promoted and enriched in order to keep close rather than as the statesman he was. The Dudley of history came from ruined nobility but used Elizabeth's patronage to foster the Renaissance. He was a patron of all the arts, scholarship, exploration, a modern business entrepreneur, and a master at foreign policy and war -- in short a fit advisor and companion for his brilliant Queen. The real Dudley's role in the Renaissance is worth knowing and there's no inkling of it here.

Whatever the flaws in this barreling narrative, all are outweighed by the sheer force of Duff's Elizabeth and the poignancy of her frustrated relationships. One admires how the girl outwits and bends the forces against her, how the woman triumphs, suffers loss, and endures the indignities of aging. At her death, we ourselves are bereaved. Her last advisor Robert Cecil tells us: "Then the flame was extinguished and she began to slip away from us. Too weak to walk, she has spent the last 15 hours standing in her chamber, refusing to sit, lest she never rise again..." (middle fingers drawn across her mouth like a child seeking comfort.) "Then after 40 years as sovereign, she quietly departed this life."

Paula Milne, writer (shown at right), and Coky Giedroyc, director, (shown below) score a triumph making Elizabeth's life and eccentricities imaginable and their plucking the extraordinary Anne-Marie Duff out of the firmament of fine actresses to get the job done. The pulsing, haunting score deserves special mention, a combination of medieval and Celtic songs and chants sung by The Mediaeval Baebes and The London Bulgarian Choir, among others.

Now that Elizabeth's story has been told over and over, it could be time to explore this period through the man who sat close to power and used his own to nurture the institutions that produced a Golden Age. That would be Sir Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, himself, a very original Renaissance man. Elizabeth I: Virgin Queen, running just under four hours, is available now on DVD and streaming from Netflix or via Amazon and Amazon Instant Video.

This post was written by TrustMovies' guest columnist, 

Lee Liberman, who will be joining us 

now and again to cover various films.

Alice Winocour's AUGUSTINE: the doctor-patient relationship gets a feminist slant

Maybe "slant" (see the headline above) is too strong a term. In AUGUSTINE, the quiet, thoughtful and surprisingly masterful first-full-length film from Alice Winocour (who was a co-writer on Ursula Meier's Home), we observe the relationship between the famous 19th century doctor, Jean-Martin Charcot, and his star patient, the titular Augustine, a girl in her late teens working as a kitchen maid who suffers from seizures and is taken to the hospital where Charcot is in charge. For me, this movie seemed a hugely feminist piece of art, though it never raises its voice or even speaks its theme aloud. Instead it simply shows us the state of women in the mid-1800s, particularly those in the lower class. And how, in every way, the male rules the roost, whether that roost be at work, play or in the domicile.

Ms Winocour, shown at right, captures the time, place and people with remarkable veracity and ease. She creates a generally dark piece, especially in terms of theme, and then executes this via the script (in which words are used sparingly yet count for much) and in the circumspect digital cinematography (by George Lechaptois), muted music (Jocelyn Pook) and beautiful, rich and oddly bleak art direction and production design (Arnoud de Moleron). Everything works toward the idea of repression, expected and carried out. Women were, in every way, available for the amusement, use, entertainment and experimentation of and by men. Nowhere in the film itself does Winocour tell us that her film is based on a real incident (in fact, on an entire slew of them). We grasp this, even so.

The filmmkaer has wisely chosen her three leading players with an eye for ability, class and in the case of the woman who plays Augustine, surprise. In this role, the singer/actress Soko (above, seen previously by me only in A l'origine) proves a wonderful choice. She has qualities both feral and elegant, intelligent and enormously sensual. Augustine appears initially needy, but uses every opportunity to learn and grow. She wins us over completely and does this by not trying. She never asks for sympathy and hence gets it in spades.

As Dr. Charcot, one of France's leading actors, Vincent Lindon (shown above and below, left), proves an inspired choice (though not, it is said, the first choice; that would have been Belgian actor Benoît Poelvoorde). Lindon does "interiority" and repression about as well as anyone, and he uses that ability here to help us understand this doctor's sense of entitlement, along with his slow coming-to-terms with his buried feelings.

Chiara Mastroianni uses her strength and her own quite special ability to indicate interior hurt to create the doctor's sadly misused wife. This woman comes from money and class and gives her husband the career connections he so needs. (Ms Mastroianni also looks sensational in mid-1800's garb.)

Augustine is open-ended, beginning in media res (ending there, too), with not everything explained or underlined along the way. Yet all you need to know -- and feel -- is here. This is a very fine first feature.

From Music Box Films and running 102 minutes, the movie opens this Friday in Manhattan at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center and Film Forum, and in Los Angeles at Laemmle's Royal, Town Center 5 and Playhouse 7.

Benoît Jacquot goes royal courtside with intelligent costumer FAREWELL, MY QUEEN

Benoît Jacquot is back this year with one of his most accessible and, I suspect, main-stream art-house movies since À tout de suite. FAREWELL, MY QUEEN, which deals with the intrigues both upstairs and downstairs during the final days at the court of Louis XVI, may initially bring to mind a French-ified and much earlier version of Downton Abbey. You needn't worry: the movie soon has the Jacquot stamp all over it: that skewed view; the interest in things farther afield from those of the standard historical costume drama; the filmmaker's concern with women and what they need, feel and think; and a very modern sensibility brought to bear upon the past.

The latter two points, I think, are much at work here, and when Jacquot, shown at left, has a theme as fraught as this one -- royalty, coming to terms with the change that is afoot and understanding that its end may be near -- the tension created provides a thrust to this film that was almost entirely missing from Jacquot's earlier period-piece Adolphe but was quite present in his even earlier, and probably best film so far, Sade. (One could suggest as best his terrific rendition of the Marivaux play La fausse suivante, which, unless you've watched the French channel, TV5, over the years, you've probably not seen. Do catch it, if ever you can.)

The film concentrates on three women: Marie Antoinette (given a wonderfully rich and nuanced portrayal by the fine Diane Kruger, above); her favored lady-in-waiting (another knockout performance from Lea Seydoux, below, from Midnight in Paris and Mysteries of Lisbon),

and an especially interesting, if brief, view of one woman, played by Virginie Ledoyen (below, in green), as the Queen's lover, who seems to have taken her pleasure with many of the men and women, high and low, around the court.

How our ladies deport themselves and use each other is fascinating, sad and real, and what we learn from this film, for all its skewed view, is so much more than we got from Sofia Coppola's attempt at depicting French royalty. (Benoît's view is much more entertaining, too.)

There are also wonderful performances from a supporting cast that includes actors/directors Noémie Lvovsky and Xavier Beauvois, plus Lolita Chammah and the upcoming, gorgeous heart-throb Vladimir Consigny, as a faux Venetian gondolier whose pole is in much demand. The finale -- suspenseful, surprising, ironic and wicked -- is a wonder to behold in a number of ways.
Bravo, Jacquot!

The film, from Cohen Media Group and running 100 minutes, opens tomorrow, Friday, July 13, in New York City, Los Angeles and San Francisco. To see all currently scheduled cities (17 of them), theaters and playdates, click here. 

Love, war and religion: Tavernier's PRINCESS OF MONTPENSIER opens

I'd see any movie by Bertrand Tavernier, usually more than once, and his latest -- THE PRINCESS OF MONTPENSIER -- is no exception, though my immediate reaction is to rank it in the lower sector of his films rather than the higher (Captain Conan, Ça commence aujourd'hui, Safe Conduct). This may be due to my being very tired when I saw it (a four-film day, of which it was the third -- though I must say that I perked up noticeably for the fourth film). A historical pageant of love and betrayal during the 16th century religious wars in France, the movie is gorgeous to view and offers some riveting battle scenes, both large & intimate.

M. Tavernier, shown at right, is a master at most genres he has attempted and, at the very least, good enough at the others. It's been awhile since he's given us an historical swashbuckler (remember the delightful Revenge of the Musketeers, aka D'Artagnan's Daughter?).  If his "Princess" initially looks like more of this swash, it is actually a good deal more serious in theme and execution, despite the sword-fights, horseback chases, and pile-up of corpses along the way.

The filmmaker has assembled a fine cast, all of whom handle period chores with flair and command. The lovely Mélanie Thierry (on poster, top, and above) plays the title princess, an intelligent young woman struggling with love, morals and the politics of the day. She's surrounded by many admirers, two of which come most heavily to the fore Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet (below, left, her eventual husband) and the "love of her life" (Gaspard Ulliel, below, right).

Though the princess is the title character, it's her tutor Lambert Wilson (below) who's the moral and emotional center of the film. M. Wilson, currently on U.S. screens in Of Gods and Men, is terrific, as usual: brave, grave and gorgeous, intelligent and caring. In addition, there is another intriguer, Raphaël Personnaz (as the semi-sleazy royalty, shown at bottom), who may indeed have a thing for our princess and most definitely has a thing for control.

Unfortunately, we're badgered continually with the would-be love affairs of the princess, and for all the fine acting, sets, costumes, cinematography and editing on display, these grow somewhat tedious before the film's 2 hours and 20 minutes are up. With nothing more than a hunch to go on, I wonder if Tavernier might have been a bit too true to the original material upon which the film is based (the short story by Madame de La Fayette, 1634–1693), rather than -- not updating it, certainly, but -- adapting it with more of an eye to modern sensibilities. As it is, we're continually made aware of the time period (and the place of women in that period), of the court intrigue and of parental control -- until we want to cry uncle: "We get it! OK?"

The Princess of Montpensier, from Sundance Selects,  open this Friday, April 15, in New York City at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema and the IFC Center. It will open simultane-ously in the Los Angeles area at the Laemmle theaters' Royal, Music Hall 3, Playhouse 7 and Town Center 5.

 Look for a limited nationwide roll-out to follow in the weeks/
months to come. The film will also be available via VOD beginning April 20.