| Dir. Rob Marshall, US/Italy, 2009, 119 mins
Cast: Daniel Day-Lewis, Nicole Kidman, Marianne Cotillard
Review by Carol Allen
This film would appear to have all the elements to make it both a classy piece of work and a mega hit on the lines of the director's previous foray into the cinematic musical "Chicago". "Nine" too is based on a Broadway hit show, which in its turn was based on the classic Fellini movie "8 1/2". It has two top writers working on the screenplay - Michael Tolkin and the late Anthony Minghella - and a terrific cast. As well as Day-Lewis in the lead as film director Guido Contini - a character loosely based by Fellini on a fantasy version of himself - there is a top notch collection of actresses playing the women in his life. Cotillard as his wife; Kidman as his muse/leading actress; Penelope Cruz, his mistress; Judi Dench, his costume designer and confidante; Kate Hudson, a journalist, with whom he enjoys a flirtation; Stacey Ferguson (Fergie of The Black Eyed Peas) as the prostitute who makes such an impression on Guido as a child and the iconic Sophia Loren as his beloved Mamma. Yet somehow the film doesn't quite hold together.
There are though many good things about, including Day-Lewis's performance as Guido, who is going through a mid life crisis, is about to shoot a new film and has no idea what it is going to be about. As he searches for inspiration, he looks back over his life and the many women in it, both past and present. Day-Lewis brings to the role a world weary charm and sophisticated angst, which is reminiscent of Marcello Mastroianni, who created the role for Fellini. Cotillard as his wife, who has abandoned her career in favour of his, has a gamine quality reminiscent of both Fellini's real life wife Giulietta Masina combined with Audrey Hepburn. Kidman plays an Anita Ekberg figure as in "La Dolce Vita" (only rather less pneumatic than the original) in a scene staged by Rome's Trevi fountain, Cruz is touching as the mistress Guido attempts to keep secret from his wife and Dench is down to earth and drily witty as his best friend. Ferguson is disappointingly slim for anyone who remembers the voluptuous La Saraghina from Fellini's original film but the black and white flashbacks of her and Guido as a child effectively recreate the visual feel of Italian films of that period. The settings too - the ornate hotels (the height of luxurious sophistication at the time), Rome itself and Cinecitta studios where Guido's memories are played out in musical form - all effectively recall the look of mid sixties movies.
The story is told in two distinct styles - realism for Guido and his problems in the present and theatricality for the musical numbers, which are staged on the studio set that has been built for the film he hasn't yet written. The problem is that the two often clash rather than complement each other. For example an affecting scene of Cotillard revealing her unhappiness to her husband is intercut with her singing a great strip tease number, "Take It All". But the two elements interrupt each other rather than working together, preventing us from getting truly involved in either. Apart from that number, La Saraghina's show stopper "Be Italian", whose choreography borrows shamelessly from Bob Fosse's staging of "Mein Herr" in "Cabaret" and Judi Dench having a ball recalling her character's youth at the Folies Bergeres, the songs themselves, while well sung, are somewhat unmemorable and as in "Chicago", Marshall's shooting of the choreography is a bit clumsy and uninspired.
The film is though still worth seeing for Day-Lewis's central performance and those of the bevy of supporting beauties around him.
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