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If, as John Keats wrote, "a thing of beauty is a joy forever", then Jane Campion's beautifully realised film about ...
If, as John Keats wrote, "a thing of beauty is a joy forever", then Jane Campion's beautifully realised film about the romance between the poet and his next-door neighbour, Fanny Brawne, will continue to inspire and touch audiences long after the DVD release of Bright Star. We join the story in London 1818, where Brawne (Abbie Cornish), a headstrong and determined young student of high fashion who is already making something of a name for herself, is initially underwhelmed by meeting Keats (Ben Whishaw) and reading his poetry. Yet, after learning that Keats has been nursing his ill younger brother, she attempts to help him and the two form an attachment that is strengthened after his brother's death.Interested to learn more about poetry and spend time with Keats, Brawne arranges for him to give her poetry lessons, fuelling the fire of their romance to the chagrin of Keats' best friend Mr Brown (Paul Schneider). When Keats has to go away for the sake of his writing, the two young lovers write to each other waiting for the day of their reunion. However, their time together is once again cut short after Keats falls ill and the pair realise that their love is likely to be torn asunder by the unstoppable force of fate.Period romances are often derided as Sunday afternoon fare that is suitable in a box set for Mother's Day; not Jane Campion's Bright Star. This is a film for anyone who has felt the pangs of true love and been swept up in a heady romance. The cinematography is as luscious as Keats' poetry, while the two leads crackle with chemistry. Cornish, in particular, is a revelation as the feisty Brawne who can't help but be carried away by the rushing momentum of her love for Keats. More romantic than any Austen adaptation, more brilliant than any Bronte, Bright Star is a shining beacon in a genre often devoid of this kind of originality and heart.
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Press Association
Oscar-winning writer-director Jane Campion ventures back to the early 19th century to compose this emotionally-wrought valentine to John Keats and ...
Oscar-winning writer-director Jane Campion ventures back to the early 19th century to compose this emotionally-wrought valentine to John Keats and his lover Fanny Brawne. Based on Andrew Motion's biography of the poet, Bright Star is a haunting portrait of two fragile souls denied happiness by virtue of their precarious social standing. Money can't buy you love, but in the rarefied social circles of Georgian England, it can certainly deny you a soulmate. So for an impoverished artist like Keats, his inability to provide financially for a wife and children denied him lasting happiness with a woman who was every bit his equal. Campion plays out the heartbreak against the backdrop of Regency-period London, conjuring some arresting imagery such as a young woman walking through a meadow awash with dazzling bluebells, or the two lovers pressing their ears to adjoining bedroom walls, listening intently for the sound of the other breathing. Bright Star is the New Zealand film-maker's most beautifully composed and deeply moving picture since 1993's triple Academy Award winner The Piano, which dealt with a turbulent love affair of a very different sort. In 1818 London, Keats (Ben Whishaw) shares lodgings with protective longtime friend Charles Brown (Paul Schneider). The building is spacious, so Brown rents out half of Wentworth Place to widow Mrs Brawne (Kerry Fox) and her brood: 18-year-old Fanny (Abbie Cornish), 14-year-old Sam (Thomas Sangster) and nine-year-old Margaret (Edie Martin). Initially, Fanny views the poet with a wary eye, dismissing his poetry without reading it, but she is slowly drawn to Keats. "I'm not sure he really likes me," the young woman tells her mother. "Mr Keats knows he cannot like you: he has no living and no income," replies the matriarch, concerned for her daughter's future. Yet Keats and Fanny are slaves to their emotions, swept up in heady emotions that inspire the poet to compose some of the greatest works of the Romantic movement, including Ode To A Grecian Urn, Ode On Melancholy and Ode To A Nightingale. Bright Star is a triumph on every level for Campion, arousing the senses with its stunning cinematography and Janet Patterson's set and costume designs, and stirring the soul with the emotionally raw performances of the two leads. Cornish is mesmerising in a complex role, at once headstrong yet vulnerable, opening her heart for the very first time. The pivotal scene in which Fanny learns of dire news from Rome leaves us choking back tears. Whishaw is equally impressive as the wordsmith who was painfully naive despite his ability to convey passion and desire so vividly in his poetry. Schneider provides a nice counterpoint in a lively, eye-catching supporting role. Campion weaves Keats's poetry seamlessly into the script as she follows the romance to its tragic conclusion and leaves us almost as heartbroken as Fanny, who never once remove, d the ring he gave her. True love never dies.
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