An average movie

Basically, it was one of those movies that garnered some buzz even before it was released and it was quite understandable. Indeed, it was the adaptation of a successful broadway musical and the last time Rob Marshall directed a musical (the dreadful ‘Chicago’), it won the Best Picture Academy award and, on top of that, there was a really impressive cast. Unfortunately, it didn’t get much love when it was released and it eventually vanished pretty quickly. Personally, I thought it was not bad (at least, it was much better than ‘Chicago’) but I can’t say I was really convinced. Above all, the main issue, in my opinion, is that, if you are a little bit familiar with Federico Fellini’s work, the movie hasn’t much to do with it. I have to confess, I have seen ‘8 ½’ only once and it was ages ago but I did watch half of his movies and this adaptation certainly didn’t capture the essence of the great master. Anyway, in my case, the most attractive aspect in this feature was to see the great Daniel Day-Lewis (considering how very few movies he might make in the future, we shouldn’t be picky, I guess) and he delivered as usual a solid performance but you wonder why he decided to join this production. Of course, the whole thing looked pretty good, there was indeed an impressive female cast (Nicole Kidman, Marion Cotillard, Penélope Cruz, Judi Dench, Sophia Loren, Kate Hudson, Fergie Duhamel) but none of the songs really blew me away and, to be honest, I was fairly bored during the whole thing. To conclude, in spite of its flaws, it remains a decent musical and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

6/10