Stardust is an underrated humorous fairy tale of the summer movie season

Rating: 10/10 (7 September 2007)

While I don't consider myself a big fan of fairy tale movies, Stardust intrigued me based on seeing Michelle Pfeiffer in the trailers as a villain (especially since I was about to see her as the bossy Velma Von Tussle in Hairspray). Boy, is she so convincingly evil here as a witch, especially with her age-ugly makeup in the beginning and end! Robert De Niro is also great as the pirate captain who's forced to hide "in the closet" to protect his "reputation"! Just about all the actors like Claire Danes, Rupert Everett, Ricky Gervais, Peter O'Toole and many others do fine work here. While Danes and Pfeiffer are classic beauties, there's also stunning faces of Sienna Miller, Olivia Grant (as Girl Bernard), and Kate Magowan especially when we first meet her. Newcomer Charlie Cox is fine as the lead Tristan and he looked so much like his father Dunstan as a young man that I thought that was him in early scenes with Magowan (actually Ben Barnes). Many comments have compared this to The Princess Bride and while I can see some resemblances, the main difference was that with PB, you always knew it was just an imaginary tale as told by an old man to his grandson. Stardust makes you believe, for the most part, that what you're seeing and hearing could have actually happened even with all the hilarity that happens throughout. So on that note, I highly recommended Stardust.