Bright Star (2009)

VERDICT:
5/10 Honest Efforts

Just wasn’t my thing.

Bright Star is about 19th Century poet John Keats and the relationship he develops with his muse, one Fanny Brawne, before his untimely death a couple years later at the age of 25.

Thought I’d give this one a shot after watching a video where Quentin Tarantino ran down his favorite movies of ’09 and mentioned that he needed to watch this one again, and being that I respect the guy’s opinions, I figured this was worth seeking out. Normally, any movie that takes place in 19th Century England, features people who dress in homemade frocks and bring back horrible memories of hours spent zoning out in one Brit. Lit. class after another doesn’t usually warrant a slot in my Netflix queue, yet somehow the impossible happened.

In hindsight, I’m more likely to believe that I misheard Tarantino and that he probably said something along the lines of, “The sun is a very bright star, Aiden,” but either way, this thing found itself a spot on my shelf for over a month and so I forced myself through two hours of indifference if only to justify my sending it back.

So, yeah, wasn’t crazy about this one, but I should have known that going in.

The acting’s fine, the directing is pretty and the story is interesting, I guess. Even though it’s based on the actual life of John Keats – whose works I am entirely unfamiliar with and have zero desire to be enlightened opon – the plot still feels very familiar and doesn’t bring anything all that new to the table. Wish I could say it had me hooked and took a bonnet-sized crap on all my preconceived notions of what period pieces are capable of, but this is not that movie.

Look, if you’ve got a major jones for everything John Keats, if you wrote your dissertation on the guy, and/or if you planning on naming all your children irrelevant of gender after him, you’ll freakin’ love this movie.

If the sound of people talking in 19th Century British dialects doesn’t put you to sleep or make you want to shove a pen in your brain, you’ll probably run and get “Bright Star” tattooed on your forehead by the time the end credits roll.

If you just finished discussing the complete works of Jane Austen at your latest book club meeting and still wish a man like Mr. Darcy would come to sweep you off your knickers, good God, see this movie, bring the Kleenex and never look back.

Shockingly enough, I can’t exactly relate to any of these reactions.

I didn’t give Bright Star a 5 out of 10 because I didn’t like it or anything, it’s just the most neutral rating I can give a movie that I have such little interest in and, as a result, can’t fairly criticize or praise. If it seems like your thing, it probably is; if it doesn’t seem like your thing, trust me, it isn’t. It’s well-made and I can understand why some folks out there might totally dig it, but I’m not even gonna pretend to be part of the choir until someone makes a movie out of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.