SAI
03-18-2005, 02:42 PM
Somersault
Dir: Cate Shortland
Cast: Abbie Cornish, Sam Worthington, Lynette Curran, Hollie Andrew
http://www.moviegoods.com/Assets/product_images/1020/255177.1020.A.jpg
When 16 year old Heidi (Cornish) kisses her Mother's boyfriend and they are caught by her Mother she immediately runs away from home. Miles away she moves into a motel run by Irene (Curran) and falteringly begins a relationship with Joe (Worthington).
Lets give credit where its due. Cate Shortland, at a visual level, is a great director. Somersault looks beautiful, the cinematography is stupendously lovely and the look of the film; from costumes to art direction to editing is hard to fault. That's all the due credit though.
The problem with Somersault is at screenplay level. Not only does the whole thing ring false but it is relentlessly boring, with scenes rarely connecting or even seeming to have much of a point within the story. The dialogue isn't terrible but you won't remember any of it either, much consists of cod profundity and serves merely to annoy.
The acting from Abbie Cornish is passable, given what she has to work with (a deeply unpleasent, rather one note character). The rest of the cast is undistinguished, particularly Lynette Curran who has an emotional scene that just ends up laughable.
There's a moment in the film where I crossed from simply not liking it to actively hating it, and actually thought about leaving. A truly laughable, hideously stupid and overblown, moment at Heidi's job. I'll let you see if you can spot it, answers on a postcard.
Dramatically Somersault is often simply an embarrasment, it never makes you care where it is going or give two craps about the people in it and also often feels exploitative as Cornish is barely allowed to don clothes after the first 40 minutes.
Because it is so visually exquisite I can't give this film the 1 star grade it deserves at every other concieveable level. Approach with extreme caution.
2/5
Dir: Cate Shortland
Cast: Abbie Cornish, Sam Worthington, Lynette Curran, Hollie Andrew
http://www.moviegoods.com/Assets/product_images/1020/255177.1020.A.jpg
When 16 year old Heidi (Cornish) kisses her Mother's boyfriend and they are caught by her Mother she immediately runs away from home. Miles away she moves into a motel run by Irene (Curran) and falteringly begins a relationship with Joe (Worthington).
Lets give credit where its due. Cate Shortland, at a visual level, is a great director. Somersault looks beautiful, the cinematography is stupendously lovely and the look of the film; from costumes to art direction to editing is hard to fault. That's all the due credit though.
The problem with Somersault is at screenplay level. Not only does the whole thing ring false but it is relentlessly boring, with scenes rarely connecting or even seeming to have much of a point within the story. The dialogue isn't terrible but you won't remember any of it either, much consists of cod profundity and serves merely to annoy.
The acting from Abbie Cornish is passable, given what she has to work with (a deeply unpleasent, rather one note character). The rest of the cast is undistinguished, particularly Lynette Curran who has an emotional scene that just ends up laughable.
There's a moment in the film where I crossed from simply not liking it to actively hating it, and actually thought about leaving. A truly laughable, hideously stupid and overblown, moment at Heidi's job. I'll let you see if you can spot it, answers on a postcard.
Dramatically Somersault is often simply an embarrasment, it never makes you care where it is going or give two craps about the people in it and also often feels exploitative as Cornish is barely allowed to don clothes after the first 40 minutes.
Because it is so visually exquisite I can't give this film the 1 star grade it deserves at every other concieveable level. Approach with extreme caution.
2/5