Skip to main content

De-Lovely (USA/UK)

By Golu
Having recently watched Amadeus, I was quite keen to see another autobiographical movie on the American composer Cole Porter. I had neither heard the name before nor did I know anything about his music but still I was looking forward to it. I must say that I wasn't disappointed. Embellished with great performances and quite high production values, the musical with a unique narration style, did keep my interest alive in the proceedings and overall the experience was very satisfactory.

When Cole Porter is about to die, his life flashes before him in a form of musical. It goes back to the time when he meets Linda, a beautiful attractive woman, whom he ends up marrying later. Linda is aware of Cole being gay and interest din men but her love and devotion is very strong and she choses to overlook that and even is ok with is flings outside marriage. She is the woman behind his success , who constantly reminds Cole how talented he is and even arranges for meetings with various bigwigs in NY and Hollywood who then contribute for Cole's success. But after a while, Linda os tired of her husband's constant philandering and their relationship goes strained. When COle is photographed in an embrace with another man in a rest room in a gay night club, both the estranged husband and wife are separately blackmailed. Cole is ok with it and still doesn't get his act together prompting Linda to leave him and go to Paris. When Cole is severely injured in a horseback riding accident, she comes back to take care of him, ignoring the fact that she herself if suffering from TB. Waiting for her impending death, she attempts to forge a relationship between him and her interior decorator so he'll have a companion following her death, which deeply affects him. The eventual amputation of his right leg adds to his deep depression, affecting his creative output.

Performances by both Cole and Linda is outstanding in my opinion. They both bring the charm, sensitivity, love and grace that their character demands. The musical number are kinda funny and are done really well. I am not much of  musical person when it comes to movies, but i did not mind this one. The film could have been trim me at various places. I liked the side story of COle's friend and his family and how that indirectly keeps Linda and Cole together. The movie, a valentine to an older way of life and of music, has a modern candor about homosexuality. Too bad it did not have more man to man scenes or occasions except most of them were more left to the viewers imagination.

The film is overall mostly delightful. (6/10)

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Shortest Distance is Round 3: Fallen Flowers

By Golu
Continuing with the weird trilogy of "The Shortest Distance", I am so glad that finally I am done with part 3 and won't have to deal with this again in future. Thankfully, as of now the makers have not announced any further parts; which will save all of us on this earth from the embarrassment of watching this in near future. After the first 10 minutes are used in sort of recapping bits of first two parts, the story moves forward. Haruto is now starting to have feelings for Ruka, the mysterious pole dancer from second part. In a fit of rage, Ruka ends up killing the goat man and to save him and Haruto, Shibahara asks them to go underground. Meanwhile Shibahara continues the search for Seiya (the guy who had cut off Haruto's penis). It turns out Seiya is now also taking care of the original club owner from part 1. Both of them were released after they had informed Shibahara of Aoyama's secret location. Shibahara tortures Seiya's boyfriend leading to Seiya killin...
5 comments
Read more

Sei no Gekiyaku (Japanese) [Dangerous Drugs of Sex]

By Golu
Every person has their own unique way of dealing with loss. This film is as much a psychological thriller as it is a soft porn BDSM portrayal of two young men that makes the film overall horrifying as well as humane. It is really hard to describe the genre of this film in one word. Its important not that the film has some really disturbing scenes so if you go into seeing this film, please proceed with caution. Although any sexual non-consensual activity is not ok, this film has its won strange way of showing that suicide is not the only solution to all life's problems. Makoto is a regular office goer, who just finds out that his girlfriend is probably cheating on him. ON top of it, his parents sudden death coming back from a trip that he forced them to take, he gets completely dejected and decides to commit suicide. Unknown to him, he is saved by mysterious man Yoda Ryoji, and he wakes up finding himself tied up in leather and belts in a very BDSM setting. This mysterious saver soo...
3 comments
Read more

One Summer Night (Korean)

By Golu
I really wanted to like this film but for non native speakers, these movie leaves a lot to be understood and the way scenes were unfolding in front of me, I wasn't sure many times what was really going on. The story had potential button getting any back story on any of the characters limited my ability to empathize with any of these actors. Film starts with two North Korea military guys Yong Joon and Jae Sung having sex and they are caught red handed and they run. Three years later we see Yong Joon in Seoul leading a very mundane and poor life. He has a boyfriend Tae-Kyu, who is a weird guy. He is carefree, doesn't do any work and is completely emotional and financially dependent on Young Joon. In fact, even Yong Joon will go to any lengths to protect him , fend for him and taking care of him to the extent of even taking up prostitution. Suddenly one day Jae Sung appears in their life again. His motivation is not clear but it is obvious he wants Yong Joon back in his life, who ...
Post a Comment
Read more