Women's Pictures - Jane Campion's Bright Star

Have you participated in Hit Me With Your Best Shot? Visual index coming tonight! 

As an end to this month-long series on Jane Campion, Bright Star presents a perfect kind of artistic summation for the writer/director. This John Keats romance is part of a tradition of filmmakers and playwrights making art about art. Though presumably about the life of an artist, the  finished play or film acts as its creator’s thesis statement about sublime inspiration (Minnelli’s Lust for Life), beauty and pain (Julie Taymor’s Frida), the thin line between madness and creation (Scorsese's The Aviator), or the creative process (Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George). Inevitably, these films and plays are as much about their creators as they are about their subjects.

Jane Campion had already made one such thesis statement earlier with An Angel at my Table, a biopic designed to explore the relationship between otherness and originality. By telling the story of Romantic poet John Keats (Ben Whishaw) from the perspective of his fiance Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish) in Bright Star, Campion explores not the creation of art, but rather art’s creative power. The audience sees Keats through Fanny’s eyes - Campion does love personal narratives - and so both Fanny and the film blossom into color. But first, we must be introduced to our young protagonist.

Campion's colorful thoughts on art and love after the jump...

Best Shot

"White. A blank canvas, or page."

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Mr & Mr Ben Whishaw!

Congratulations to Ben Whishaw who confirms he's gay and happily married to Mark Bradshaw, the composer.

Whishaw & Bradshaw

Here's a cute trivia note that too few sites will mention: Bradshaw scored Whishaw's rare romantic leading man gig in Bright Star (2009) where the actor played the poet John Keats. Good god that movie is underappreciated... except for here at TFE where it won multiple nominations in its year. If it brought them together it's even more lovely in retrospect. 

Bradshaw recently scored the Emmy-nominated miniseries Top of the Lake (it's mesmerizing - watch it!) and Whishaw will next be seen in Terry Gilliam's Zero Theorem, the next James Bond film reprising his "Q" role, and possibly a Ron Howard picture called In the Heart of the Sea. 

May Flowers in "Bright Star"

Andrew here using May Flowers celebrations to talk about one of my favourite 21st century films.

If you asked me to pick a single image to represent movies from 2000 onwards chances are that I’d choose this specific image from Jane Campion’s Bright Star. It’s still one of those movie images seared into my brain, four years after I first saw it. Campion’s 2009 film has so many things going for it, and Greg Fraiser’s peerless cinematography is somewhere towards the top. It’s not quite my favourite film of its year but it is, easily, my choice for “most beautiful” and that’s not just because it has the prettiest couple heading its romance. [more...]

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Reader of the Day: Kyle

March is winding down. Only three more Readers of the Day. Please let us know if you'd like to see future Reader Spotlights, albeit less frequently, in some capacity. Today we're talking to Kyle by way of Ohio and now South Carolina.

Nathaniel: When did you start reading the Film Experience?
KYLE: I started reading in 2004. I appreciated your love for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The Oscar coverage, witty writing, and overall admiration for cinema kept me coming back. I've visited the site at least once, every day, for the past six (almost seven) years.

I love to hear that. Okay, what was your first movie / movie obsession?
KYLE: The first movie I definitely remember seeing in a theater was Jurassic Park and I totally fell asleep! I remember my eyes slowly closing right after the T-Rex attacked the kids in the car.

I had several movie obsessions when I was younger, but two really stick out.  I would watch The Witches EVERY day when I was about four. I would put it in, demand to be left alone, and wouldn't budge until the end credits. My dad learned this the hard way, when after coming to pick me up (divorced parents), I refused to go with him until it was over. Don't come between me and my Anjelica Huston! My next major obsession was with Scream. Random I know, but I could recite the dialogue scene by scene when I was like ten or eleven.

 

Your three favorite classics and three favorite contemporary films. Spill.

Umm...toughest question ever? Okay first thoughts, or I'd stall all day. Classics: Halloween, Rear Window, Suspiria (I realize those are all suspense/horror, and I'm cool with that.) Contemporary: American Beauty, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Interview with the Vampire.

These are a few of Kyle's Favorite Things...

Take away and Oscar and give it to someone else: Who, when, why?
Recently: Sandra Bullock. I'd love to just snatch it out of her hands (gently so not to harm him), and hand it to Abbie Cornish (I will always defend Bright Star, and how excellent every aspect of it was.)  I really do like Sandra, but her winning was so...wrong. Abbie wasn't even nominated but she completely moved me in that film.

 

The biopic of your life. What's it like?
It'd be called Who Am I Trying to Impress?, which is a saying I often use when I'm about to do or say something I know I shouldn't. It would obviously star me, and be directed by Darren Aronofsky.  I'm sure he'd make my nights of sitting on my bed, eating peanut butter, and watching American Idol seem way more interesting.  I just hope he'll make some creative changes and give me orange hair and add my very own lesbian sex scene.