A murderous plot, a scavenger hunt for elusive Banksy and a fashion icon
Loosely based on the 2007 Meredith Kercher murder case that made accused killer (since cleared) Amanda Knox into a tabloid sensation, Michael Winterbottom’s The Face of An Angel is a lovely-looking yet muddled meditation on truth.
Daniel Bruhl plays struggling movie director Thomas Lang, in Tuscany seeking screenwriting inspiration from American journo Simone Ford (Kate Beckinsale). She’s written a book about the stabbing death of English student Elizabeth (Sai Bennett) and he wants her help finding the true story as the trial of her roommate Jessica (Genevieve Gaunt), charged with killing her, unfolds.
Simone may be more than a guide to Thomas’s screenplay, but he’s hardly ready for closeness. He’s navigating a failed marriage and an absent daughter. If he feels like he’s in hell, surrounded by frenzied media covering the trial and the locals who want a piece of the action to help him, it’s inspired him to use Dante’s The Divine Comedy as a device for his film’s narrative.
Ill-advised fantasy scenes intrude as the drama that began as a story about how deadlines and headlines steamrolled the memory of a murder victim shifts to become about a man’s descent and Thomas makes his voyage through Dante’s described hell, purgatory and heaven. In the last stop, he’s aided by winsome university student Melanie (a new talent, British model Cara Delevingne, echoing Elle Fanning). Linda Barnard
Whether you think Banksy is a legitimate artist, digital-age snake oil salesman (or woman, or collective — who knows?), director Chris Moukarbel’s engaging chronicle of the anonymous British street artist’s 2013 New York residency reveals a provocative social experiment and raises questions about ownership of public art.
Banksy announced he’d produce one piece of art daily for a month at secret locations. Clues, Tweets and posts sent self-described Banksy Hunters on the chase, represented by an engaging pair of dog walkers who videoed their daily sojourns.
Seeing the art first seemed less important than taking a photo of it. Rival street artists defaced some and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg decried the works as vandalism. Others were stolen. Can you steal public art? They are worth a good sum, after all. Banksy set up a stall to sell canvases for $60 as one day’s installation. Few bit. They’re now worth hundreds of thousands.
The often-political artworks show Banksy’s diversity, going beyond the black-and-white stencils he’s become famous for. Among them, a slaughterhouse-bound truck filled with stuffed animals squeaking in distress and a grim reaper figure riding a bumper car around a derelict lot. But when a sphinx-like sculpture shows up in Queens, things get weird. Linda Barnard
What is about late French fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent that makes him so topical that two major biopics have been made about him in the past year?
Comparisons will surely be made between Yves Saint Laurent, directed by Jalil Lespert, and the latest one, entitled simply Saint Laurent, the superior film of the two, an official entry for the Palme D’Or at last year’s Cannes Film Festival.
While the earlier film looked at the famed designer’s entire life, Saint Laurent focuses on the years between 1967 and 1976. At the height of his fame, we see a man whose life begins to spiral out of control due to a general decadence involving Champagne, drug use and anonymous sex.
The film spends little time exploring the relationship between Saint Laurent and his longtime lover and business partner, Pierre Berge, choosing instead to focus more on his self-destructive dalliance with Jacques de Bascher, roguishly well played by Louis Garrel.
The charismatic Gaspard Ulliel is well cast in the lead role — which requires baring all in one scene — believably conveying a man torn between his creative genius and his hedonistic desires.
Evoking the era through period detail and occasional footage, director Bertrand Bonello has created a cautionary tale about the price of fame and celebrity. Bruce DeMara