Captain Corelli's Mandolin

Rating:
Summary: Heartbreaking
Review: Respect to all involved in the production of this movie, it was absolutely heartbreaking. This is a moving tale of love and war, which also tells the story of the Italian massacre to which a huge amount of people do not know about. Anyone can enjoy this movie, it has just the right amount of romance, comedy and action. Performances by Nicolas Cage and Penelope Cruz were intoxicating. This is a must see!!

Rating:
Summary: Pizza and Chianti for this slow-mo tearjerker
Review: A confession: I did not read the book. From what I can gather from reviewers, those who did read "Corelli" were sadly disappointed by Hollywood's hatchet job. Whaddja expect?

As for the besotted grognard that I am, and not having been contaminated by prior perusal of that sensitive and romantic novel, I found the DVD "Corelli" to be a passable evening's entertainment, not great, but OK. I happen to be a Nicholas Cage fan, although he is showing signs of overexposure in real turkey movies ("e.g. "Windtalkers") but still shows brilliance in films like "Matchstick Men." He is best when playing eccentric characters ("Raising Arizona") and does less well when confined. "Corelli" is somewhere in between. His Italian accent is OK but along the lines of the old faux Italian restaurant operator in the ad, "Chianti for everybody!" I found Penelope Cruz to be an unconvincing Greek, but how many convincing Greeks are there between Irene Pappas and Anthony Quinn?

The story line is plausible. We see a happy and prosperous Greek fishing village where Penelope Cruz and her physician father live high on a hill above the town. A swarthy but otherwise illiterate young fisherman yens for Cruz but she is hesitant (this is about all we get to know about the dark handsome fisherman, who eventually runs off to join the partisans). Suddenly, the war intervenes and the Italians arrive to take over the town, assisted by a few Germans who are, at this point, non-assertive. (Italy attacked Greece from Albania in the fall of 1940, got pushed back into Albania, and was ultimately bailed out of its embarrassment by German forces in the spring of 1941.)

I suspect that in the book, the Italians are more complex; here, Corelli's artillerymen would rather sing opera and drink wine than tend to their guns. Corelli's guileless charm ultimately wins over Cruz (she likes him, she likes him not) and a young German liaison officer who senses that his Italian allies are great drinking buddies but unreliable. Flash forward to 1943: Italy capitulates to the Allies and attempts (mostly unsuccessfully) to switch sides; Corelli's troops are forcibly detained by the German occupation forces. I will not get into the resulting tragedy, but I liked the treatment of this volatile period for the Italians in WW2. I will not describe what happens to Corelli himself, save that I began to draw uncomfortable parallels to another tear-jerker, "The English Patient."

I found the earthquake scene near the end of the movie stupid. Was this to draw a connection between the natural disaster and manmade disaster that was WW2? Hit me over the head. And why does Corelli stay away so long after the war? It's like the Rafe (Afflick) character in "Pearl Harbor", who disappears while flying overseas with the RAF, and then after many months all he can pen to his girlfriend is a hastily scrawled note, "I am alive." Is the man illiterate? Was he in a coma? They did have telephones. Or Western Union.

OK, so a typical Hollywood romantic war-date movie, worthy of a pizza and some cheap Italian plonk.

Rating:
Summary: could have been a good movie with a different set of actors
Review: I can't stand either Nicolas Cage or Penelope Cruz so I was prepared to hate it. It wasn't as bad as I anticipated but it wasn't great either. Nicolas Cage is a terrible actor and his fake Italian accent was getting on my nerves in a major way. All the Italians in the movie joke around and sing-that all they do. I also couldn't see how they(N and P) fell in love. One day they just were. Yeah, right. I have to add one more thing and its about Penelope's looks. I think with right clothes and makeup she can look decent but in this movie she looks downright horrid. Her hair is done in the most unflattering hairdo on the planet and her clothes look as if she robbed the scarecrow. Whether the look was intentional or accidental is a mystery. The ending was incredibly stupid. He leaves Penelope until the war is over and then doesn't come back until two years later because he feels guilty about coming between her and her fiancé. Give me a break

Rating:
Summary: "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" a Disappointment
Review: As much as a NORMALLY LOVE Penelope Cruz (that's sarcasm, folks!) her performance in "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" isn't so much acting as it is a series of gawky smiles or frowns accompanied by girlish squeeks and squaks. This terrible acting is accented by Nicolas Cage, whose performance makes it seem like he researched his Italian accent by playing "Super Mario Bros." games.

Thus are the weaknesses of "Captain Corelli's Mandolin," a valiant effort of a film that, nevertheless, fails to sizzle. And while the film does have its strengths, they ultimately can't save this picture.

Those strengths include John Hurt and Christian Bale. John Hurt plays the highly cliche part of "Wise Old Papa," and the part is, indeed, highly predictable and run-of-the-mill. But John Hurt is such a subtle and charming actor that he manages to rise above the part and make it a highly enjoyable performance, nevertheless. And Christian Bale does a convincing performance that makes him almost unrecognizable as Penolope Cruz's fiance before "Mamma Mia Nicolas Cage" comes into the story (It's hard to believe that this is the same Christian Bale who only a year before was playing an American WASP in "American Psycho"). These strong performances are coupled with beautiful locations and very smooth-looking cinematography.

Still, these strengths cannot save a dulled-down story and terrible leads, and all in all, "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" is a disappointment. If by chance it happens to be on TV, I'd reccommend a quick watch of it, but if not, than you should probably save your money with this one.

Rating:
Summary: Long, but beautifully acted and staged.
Review: "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" (2001)

Love triangles in war movies are quite the trend lately. In Pearl Harbour the script relied on many one-liners and sunsets to portray the love story between, but in Captain Corelli's Mandolin the love story is used through music and expression, which I found to be very different and enjoyable. This movie is very different to Pearl Harbour though, it's more mature and the war story is generally more important than the romance one.

There were some things that occasionally annoyed me about the film like the fact that Penelope Cruz continuously is picking flowers or berries (it seems the only excuse for her to bump into Nicholas Cage outside of their home) and the Italians are always singing. The fact that they sing and play the mandolin and all that is very heart-warming but as Cruz points out in one scene "all you do is sing!" It got a bit tedious after a while.

The movie is also quite boring in places. Some of the scenes are reasonably unnecessary and dull. The movie is a little too drawn-out at the start for my liking. There wasn't enough going on in the first hour to maintain my interest for very long.

Luckily, the film improves when the war story starts getting a bit more serious. Much of the first hour is for building up characters, atmosphere and setting. Always a good thing, but some of it was unnecessary as I mentioned before. In the second hour the movie really revs up and gets into action. The love story is thrusted into the plot with great tenderness (and thankfully there are no corny lines!) and the war scenes are more exhilarating and action-packed.

Some things throughout the film were always good. Such as the script, which always maintained its heart and soul and development. The scenery was always lucious and stunning and a feast for the eyes. The sets were perfect and very well designed for the period. The tenseness between Cruz and Cage was heating up. The shocks were still delivering after 2 hours. But there was still that occasional uninteresting sequence.

The acting stays brilliant throughout the movie and kept me watching always. Cage delivers a stunner again, as the warm-hearted and music-loving captain of the Italians. I've never noticed this before but Cage looks outstandingly Italianish, and he fits the role perfectly. Cruz is sweet and nicely cast in her 40's frocks. Bale's character is one I didn't really like that much but he gave a good performance, but if you're a big fan of his I recommend checking out American Psycho. John Hurt who played Pelagia's (Cruz) father was by far the best performer in the film, his character was a moustache-twirling admirable philosopher and Hurt just slipped into the character with such enthusiasm and easiness he ignited the screen!

John Madden is fast becoming one of my favourite directors. He's directed such films as Mrs. Brown, Shakespeare in Love and now Captain Corelli's Mandolin. Madden is excellent at staging his films and making them look great. His effort with camera shots is stunning. Even better, he has a knack for always developing his characters and picking two of them to have a closeness that intrigues the audience. Madden covers all areas of filmmaking that need to be and I would establish him as a very promising director and writer. I appreciated his vision with this one and I look forward to more films from him in the next couple of years.

People should not trust the critics who didn't like this film so much and catch the movie. It has a good plot, it's beautifully staged and very well-acted. It really keeps you engaged and wondering what's going to happen next. Add to that it has a variety of different characters and emotions, and its sounds beautiful too with the fabulous singing and playing of the mandolin (yes, I didn't know what it was either!). This is not one I highly recommend if you don't have a lot of patience though.

MY GRADE: B

Rating:
Summary: Unsatisfying
Review: OK, I am biased. I read Louis deBernières' book when it was fashionable among Greek Americans. I have visited Kefalonia for years - my father's family originated there. I had exacting expectations for the movie. It did not satisfy me in any way, except that the island looked great (always summer) and the broad-brush treatment of history didn't skew the facts (only obscure them).

That said, Nicholas Cage should be sent to vocal training classes. His Italian "accent" was unbelievably bad, and nearly eclipsed his poor acting. The Corelli character was written as a very quirky, intellectual and decidedly unsoldierly soldier. Cage came across as a buffoon. It would be easy to mistake the inept portrayal of the Italians onscreen as real ineptness in the actual war; but this is a film review.

For a novel that spans multiple characters and many years, two hours is too little to cover everything. So it's the screenwriter's job to clarify and enhance those parts of the story that will entertain and inform the viewer. I didn't get any of that, and I know more than the casual viewer in this case. Even so, the movie comes across as a tepid love story set amid war. War is presented as a harmless occupation, where people don't actually exhibit the effects of deprivation, never suffer from the cold and disease and the villages are filled with dancing and music. Oh, yes, Penelope Cruz doing a suggestive dance in front of the Italian and German soldiers (and in front of the Greek mothers and fathers in 1941) is entirely plausible... in Hollywood.

Films like "Mediterraneo," "Cinema Paradiso" and "Il Postino," all showed the themes of war, romance, postwar life, etc. with more subtlety and less obvious string-tugging. "Captain Corelli's Mandolin" would have been a superb (though less commercially viable) film had it been a foreign cast and a different director.

Rating:
Summary: Barely survives...
Review: ...Nicholas Cage, who is one of my favorite actors but who was OUTRAGEOUSLY MISCAST in this film!!! Cage excels in paying angry, wacky, unhinged, and/or offbeat characters---NOT the dashing and gallant Italian army officer in this film! I couldn't help guffawing through much of the movie as he was trying his best to dish out long lingering cow-eyes at his leading lady, or speaking oh so PASSIONATELY in the fake Italian accent.

Luckily Penelope Cruz provides lots of soothing and distracting eye candy, as does the stunning natural landscape of the Greek island the film was shot at, otherwise I would've been out the door within the first 15 minutes. John Hurt also puts in a decent performance as her father, the venerable and oh-so-wise village doctor.

The main problem with this movie is that despite the authentic location and beautifully made sets (the village was totally constructed for the film), it just all feels very FAKE---from Cage's horrific miscasting to the fake Italian-accented English he and all the non-Italian, non-Greek cast members speak throughout. The Italians, Germans, and Greeks are all portrayed in the simplest and well-worn stereotypes. The story is also unevenly paced and the plot, while it does have a few somewhat unexpected twists towards the end, is mostly predictable.

The brief war scenes are also disappointing, their lack of physical authenticity reminded me of some 1970s war movies, long before the advent of "Platoon" and especially "Saving Private Ryan."

It's really a shame, because I'm sure that in the hands of a talented Italian director like Giuseppe Tornatore ("Cinema Paradiso") and with an all-European cast speaking their native languages and us reading subtitles, this film could've easily been 200% better!

Really about the best thing in this film is the fleeting glimpse not only of Penelope's lovely uppper torso but more deliciously, of her coal-black but neatly-trimmed armpit hair during the one very PG-13 (read: tame, vanilla stuff) love scene. This is about the single most physically appealing and authentic moment in the whole 2 hours, I'm afraid.

I'm afraid what the Germans couldn't do to this little Greek island (the film is supposedly based on a true story), Hollywood accomplished fairly quickly: blow all into little pieces, on the way to the bank.

Rating:
Summary: Worse than bad
Review: Here's the thing, I love Penelope, think Nicholas Cage is OK, and absolutely loved reading this book, however, I found it difficult to watch this movie. It was worse than bad. Nick's Italian accent was abismal, despite the fact that he's related to M. Scorsese or Coppola or whoever it is. Don't waste your time or money when you can spend half the money and plenty of downtime w/a fantastic read.

Rating:
Summary: Pizza and Chianti for this slow-mo tearjerker
Review: A confession: I did not read the book. From what I can gather from reviewers, those who did read "Corelli" were sadly disappointed by Hollywood's hatchet job. Whaddja expect?

As for the besotted grognard that I am, and not having been contaminated by prior perusal of that sensitive and romantic novel, I found the DVD "Corelli" to be a passable evening's entertainment, not great, but OK. I happen to be a Nicholas Cage fan, although he is showing signs of overexposure in real turkey movies ("e.g. "Windtalkers") but still shows brilliance in films like "Matchstick Men." He is best when playing eccentric characters ("Raising Arizona") and does less well when confined. "Corelli" is somewhere in between. His Italian accent is OK but along the lines of the old faux Italian restaurant operator in the ad, "Chianti for everybody!" I found Penelope Cruz to be an unconvincing Greek, but how many convincing Greeks are there between Irene Pappas and Anthony Quinn?

The story line is plausible. We see a happy and prosperous Greek fishing village where Penelope Cruz and her physician father live high on a hill above the town. A swarthy but otherwise illiterate young fisherman yens for Cruz but she is hesitant (this is about all we get to know about the dark handsome fisherman, who eventually runs off to join the partisans). Suddenly, the war intervenes and the Italians arrive to take over the town, assisted by a few Germans who are, at this point, non-assertive. (Italy attacked Greece from Albania in the fall of 1940, got pushed back into Albania, and was ultimately bailed out of its embarrassment by German forces in the spring of 1941.)

I suspect that in the book, the Italians are more complex; here, Corelli's artillerymen would rather sing opera and drink wine than tend to their guns. Corelli's guileless charm ultimately wins over Cruz (she likes him, she likes him not) and a young German liaison officer who senses that his Italian allies are great drinking buddies but unreliable. Flash forward to 1943: Italy capitulates to the Allies and attempts (mostly unsuccessfully) to switch sides; Corelli's troops are forcibly detained by the German occupation forces. I will not get into the resulting tragedy, but I liked the treatment of this volatile period for the Italians in WW2. I will not describe what happens to Corelli himself, save that I began to draw uncomfortable parallels to another tear-jerker, "The English Patient."

I found the earthquake scene near the end of the movie stupid. Was this to draw a connection between the natural disaster and manmade disaster that was WW2? Hit me over the head. And why does Corelli stay away so long after the war? It's like the Rafe (Afflick) character in "Pearl Harbor", who disappears while flying overseas with the RAF, and then after many months all he can pen to his girlfriend is a hastily scrawled note, "I am alive." Is the man illiterate? Was he in a coma? They did have telephones. Or Western Union.

OK, so a typical Hollywood romantic war-date movie, worthy of a pizza and some cheap Italian plonk.

Rating:
Summary: Good movie ... if you have not read the book
Review: If this movie had been an original screenplay, I would think it brilliant, lovely, and wonderful. However, I read the book first (which I absolutely adored) so the story was set in my mind. The movie cut so many scenes that I thought were completely necessary to the plot, and added silly Hollywood scenes in their place. The film relegated major characters in the book (like Carlo Guerccio) to one or two lines in the film. In my opinion, this was a big mistake by the screen writers.

Cage and Cruz played their respective parts well in this film. Cage was funny and quirky like Corelli's character is described in the book, and Cruz honed in on Pelagia's quiet, reserved nature. Christian Bale looked surprisingly Greek in the movie, playing Pelagia's fiancé, Mandras. Although his character in the novel was the complete opposite in the filml, he played the part well. Dr. Iannis was intelligent, kind, and loving, and his character in the film translated the same way.

In conclusion, the movie is good and beautiful, but it pales in the light of the novel. Read the book!