Product: Head in the Clouds (2004)
Rating: 1.0
Banal & Boring!!
"Head in the Clouds" is a historical romance/drama, which takes place in Europe before and during WWII. Although it covers an extremely fascinating period in terms of world events, this thoroughly disagreeable film takes little advantage of the many interesting storyline possibilities that history offers. What I'd like to know is, whatever possessed director/screenwriter John Duigan to turn beautiful, gifted Charlize Theron into a grotesque caricature of herself. And how did he do it? Was he using voodoo? Sally Bowles she most definitely is not! (although Liza Minnelli gave a stellar performance in that role). There are even scenes where the incomparable Penelope Cruz looks preposterous, as the uncomfortable third wheel in a menage-a-threesome.Ms. Theron plays Gilda Besse, the narcissistic playgirl daughter of a wealthy American socialite, (a suicide), and a French champagne tycoon, who is somewhat mad. She warns a lover, who fantasizes about a possible future with her, along with their potential children, "I have doomed genes!" Gilda has worked as a photographer, a dancer and an actress in a Hollywood movie, but mostly she dabbles. She always appears to be vamping for a camera lens, even when there is no apparent camera. Her wardrobe is simply gorgeous though. Probably the best part of the movie is watching the innumerable costume changes - usually one per scene, but we get two-for-one when Penelope Cruz is around to model. Another high point is cinematographer Paul Sarossy's wonderful footage of Paris. The movie is almost worth renting just to look at the Paris cityscapes.Anyway, before Gilda went to live in gay Paree, where she was to lose any vestige of freshness she may still have had at age 23, she was in England - Cambridge to be exact. One night, she wandered tipsily into the university dormitory room of Guy Malyon, (Stuart Townsend). He is a Dublin-born student on scholarship, and the son of an Irish policeman. In real life, Townsend and Charlize are a couple, and I am sure they make a charming twosome. However, in this movie, there is zilch chemistry between them. He is a handsome, sincere, if somewhat naive young man, but certainly not mature or edgy enough for Gilda, who eats men alive. She is too busy posing to stir up much heat with anyone, anyway. Guy and Gilda meet, once again, at an extremely wild party on a country estate. They are intimate on a billiard table, and then Gilda bids him adieu. She is off to see the world. In one of her parting lines, she mentions Arabia. Hah!! Meanwhile, Guy become a teacher and social activist as fascism looms over Europe.Years pass and Guy cannot forget Gilda. The very thought of her sends his hormones off the charts. So when she contacts him once more and asks him to visit her in Paris - he's off in a flash to the City of Lights! He finds her with a variety of meaningless lovers, working at "photography as art." She remains unattainable, even as he holds her. I think Gilda is supposed to come across as carefree - but she is too studied and jaded to be the free-spirit type. The lovely Spanish Mia, (Cruz), was an exotic dancer until Miss Besse brought her home to stay. She now lives with Gilda and Gilda's current man-of-the-moment.Politics and war finally overtake Europe and ruin Gilda's plans, especially when both Guy and Mia depart to fight for Republican Spain. She is furious that the two are leaving. "There will always be wars," she tells them, "you need to get rid of the guilt." To say anything more would be to spoil what plot there is. One gets the feel that because Gilda, as a teen, had her fortune told, and it wasn't a good one, she believes life is preordained. All is fate. Therefore she lives as much and as fast as she can before karma can overtake her.This is one of the rare occasions that I write, without qualification, don't bother with "Head In The Clouds." Banal and boring!JANA