Good stock fantasy

Rating: 7/10 (23 August 2007)

If any style of film could be called my "guilty pleasure", it'd be this generic fantasy type. Guilty is the wrong word for it, though, as I'm pretty pleased to be an escapist from time to time. "Stardust" is good stock fantasy, the likes of which one should expect from Neil Gaiman (or Gaiman adaptation, as it were). It isn't the visual dream-scape of Mirrormask, it isn't the adult pretension of Pan's Labyrinth, and it isn't the fun-loving classic The Princess Bride, but it contains just what the fantasy-lover is familiarized enough with to be completely comfortable during the entire viewing. Fantasy lovers should rejoice--special effects work has finally become good enough and cheap enough that this stuff is in regular production now.
The story of Stardust involves a young man named Tristan who, in order to gain the love and approval of the most beautiful girl in their small town of Wall, goes on an adventure to retrieve a fallen star. To make things difficult, however, Tristan's fallen star is actually a woman named Yvaine, and he's not the only one looking for her... some witches have their greedy eyes on the immortality the star's heart can give, and a brother's feud over the magic kingdom leads murderous princes in her direction.
From there it's all pretty predictable, but it involves some attractive fantasy elements, some warm-hearted commentary on the nature of love, and the best part, Robert DeNiro as a gay pirate. On that note, DeNiro's performance is spot-on... it's not the excessive lisp that most actors use to portray gay people, but a surprisingly effective one from someone used to being seen as a rough-and-gruff typecast character (thus the ongoing joke surrounding his character matching DeNiro's own opening up into alternate forms of acting). DeNiro hasn't been so unique to his own image since Brazil, and that's saying something.
Stardust is the type of movie, perhaps, that will subsist on children's and fantasy-lover's shelves for a long time. I can't say it offers anything new, but it's not really there to. It's actually those most familiar with it's tropes that will enjoy it the most.
--PolarisDiB