Scholastic desperation

Rating: 7/10 (5 February 2009)

I have heard a lot of people complaining about this movie being neglected by the Oscars for the major prizes. Although an Oscar nomination does not automatically translate into universally accepted excellence (see: The English Patient, Shakespeare in Love, etc etc...), I do not see this lack of nominations as a tremendous injustice: this is movie is good, but not very good. I have not read the book it is taken from, so maybe its shortcomings are a direct consequence of the novel's...this depends on how faithful is the script, especially when it comes to dialogs and characters' interaction in general. The acting is good (Winslet's better than Di Caprio's but this does not come as a surprise) but some lines where really either over the top or trivial. A movie that claims to be a merciless depiction of how ugly a relationship can get cannot rely on trite clichés like a woman accusing a man of not being a man, or an "Idiot savant" who explicitly tells it like it is with his acute insights and tongue-in-cheek blabber. In many scenes of the movie I felt like the characters were explaining their inner world, in a very simple and clear way. Like in 5th grade. We're all grown up here, people. Let's move on. So, well done, but it could have been so much better. 7 out of 10.