Rating: 
Summary: Beautiful, you will want to visit Paris...
Review: In WILDE, Stephen Fry (Jeeves in "Jeeves and Wooster") is the consummate Wilde. Jude Law plays his lover Bosie Douglas. Jennifer Ehle (Elizabeth Bennett in "Pride and Predjudice") plays Wilde's long suffering wife. Vanessa Redgrave and Tom Wilkinson also have important roles. What a cast. The Belle Epoch is beautifully recreated as Wilde travels between England and France--clothes, interiors, architecture, grounds. You don't even have to understand the story to enjoy "being there" in the parks, homes, carrriages. Oscar Wilde was a writer, best remembered perhaps for "The Portrait of Dorian Grey" although modern audiences may be more familiar with his stage play "The Ideal Husband" (recently made into a film with Jeremy Northern and Cate Blanchett) or "The Importance of Being Earnest." Wilde was a homosexual in England in an age when one could and did go to prison for acting on instinct. (Nowadays in Saudia Arabia they take off your head.) Although the public became aware of his proclivities, Wilde remained one of Europe's most admired writers. Unfortunately, his term in prison for his sexual preferences may be remembered longer than his works which contain a wonderful drawing room humor many folks fail to grasp. This is a great film, and if you're an Anglophile you must add it to your collection. -- And Paris?? That's where Oscar is buried.
Rating: 
Summary: Mostly Excellent, with the Gay Aspect Overdone..
Review: Great costumes, scenery, architecture, dialogue, and actors almost make this a real classic! Fry sems to be close to Oscar's double, and plays a role that is (mostly) very sensitive, and supremely intelligent. Oscar's family life is also done very well. However, his creative life is underplayed, while his homosexual side overdone here (not to mention overshown). We never really get a true picture of this great wit and conversationalist, though Mr. Fry as Oscar gives it his best shot! Still about 95% Excellent, and worthy of this sad story of the unmaking of an Irish/English turn of the last century literary genius!
Rating:
Summary: A Superb Film...
Review:
Putting aside the fact that this is a lovingly enacted biopic of Wilde, the film itself is an outstanding work of cinematographic art: everything about it is absolutely wonderful: the cinematography; the soundtrack; the acting; the costumes; the set designs; the dialogue; the point of view; the dramatic design; &ct. Superb!
Rating: 
Summary: subject
Review: They should have gotten Gene Wilder to play Oscar Wilde. It would have made this movie a lot Wilder.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding and riveting portrayals make WILDE a must see!
Review: This is a most engrossing picture.From start to finish WILDE is a great screenplay focusing on the conflict of genius playwrite Oscar Wilde as a man caught between the intense love for his wife and children and his true emergent sexuality obcessing over one Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas.Stephen Fry as an extremely sensitive yet naive Wilde ,and Jude Law as the vindictive and spoiled Bosie ignite the screen with great passion showing why they are two of the finest actors of their time.The ever luminescent Jennifer Ehle portrays Mrs.Wilde with proper reserve and vulnerability.The soundtrack by Debbie Wiseman is a magnificent accompaniment to an artfully directed screenplay by Brian Gilbert.This is not a movie to learn about the works of Wilde;but rather it is a film to explore the inner workings of the man who was the arguably greatest writer of his era.So often we divorce the man from his writings.This movie enhances Wilde's writings by showing us the man.GOOD STUFF.GET IT!The nudity in the story is totally appropriate to the plot and is handled in a sensitive and non pornographic manner.A truly magnificent film in all areas.
Rating:
Summary: How did this film get by me?
Review: I accidently came across this film on Amazon. I didn't know it existed. I've read several biographies on Wilde and was greatly moved by 'De Profundis' as a young man, so I immediately ordered it from Amazon.
There is not a bad moment here. Stephen Fry is Oscar Wilde. The wit, the charm, the intelligence, the endless unfolding of Wilde's brilliance gushes across the widescreen. The added dialogue couldn't have been written better if it had been written by Wilde himself. And Jude Law's performance is equally superb. He's beautiful, temperamental, demanding, self-aborbed and everything one wants and will eventually pay the price for if one indulges for too long.
The dvd format enhances the film's quality production. The extras are equally engaging. To hear the inside perspectives and 'scoops' add not only to the film, but to the relevance Wilde and his life had on not only every gay man, but every thinking man.
One can't help but be angry by the stupidity and waste behind Oscar Wilde's life and demise. He was flaming and entertaining, and so full of life that one couldn't help but catch fire. He is an important ingredient in our heritage of humankind's thinking men of genius and civility as well as that all too human underbelly of desire and vulnerbility just beneath the surface within each and everyone of us.
Rating:
Summary: Flawless
Review: Everything about this movie is utterly inpeccable. The story (based on Richard Ellmann's biography of Wilde)is as historically accurate as it is entertaining. The acting is perfectly incredible, with wonderful performances by Stephen Fry as the tremendous but simultaneously tragic Oscar Wilde, and Jude Law as his complex young lover Lord Alfred "Boise" Douglas. This movie is an absolute must for any fan of Oscar Wilde, or anyone with an open mind who enjoys learning about extraordinary people. Please do not let some of the homosexual themes in this movie intimidate you away from watching this movie. I will admit that at first I was a little uneasy about watching a movie with homosexual love affairs in it, but when I wached this movie I felt like they were absolutely not over-done but historically correct and they fit perfectly into this exceptional movie about the wonderful Oscar Wilde. I strongly recommend this movie to anyone and everyone who is mature and open-minded enough to see it. I think you will fall in love with this amazing story about the compelling wit, charm, and life of Oscar Wilde.
Rating: 
Summary: Whoa Nelly!
Review: Yikes! I picked this movie up to see some real British Favorites of mine like Jude Law, Ioan Gruffudd, Jennifer Ehle, and to get a glance at Orlando Bloom. I was horrified to see too much of the "goings on" of Oscar Wilde with my favorite Brit actors. I don't recommend this film to those who are even a little bit guarded about what they watch. The movie may have been an accurate portrayal of Oscar Wilde's sex life, but a bit too "showing" for me. The sexual scenes are too much whether the characters are homosexual or not. I felt like these scenes monopolized the film and that the movie was made more to shock people than to really portray the great writer--Oscar Wilde. I watched this movie with a group of my friends and all of us were not prepared to "see" the material given in this film, it just is not necessary. Leave your imagination at the door because there is no use for it--you cannot imagine much more than what is presented to you. It got so bad that I thought that I would just fast forward through the sex scenes, but then I realized that I was fast forwarding half the movie...time that could of been spent on meaningful dialogue or expressions of his artisic passion that the world reveres him for. Yes, we know that he was gay...point made! That is fine and it is accepted but why must it ALL be on film? There are more clever ways to film his life. I realize that my opinion is unpopular to whomever even cares to watch this movie, but it is hard for me to justify watching this film when every other scene is pornographic. I have to admit, however, that the actors portrayals were more than convincing...there was no holding back.
Rating:
Summary: Stephen Fry's memorable performance as the tragic Oscar
Review: My introduction to Oscar Wilde consisted of three disparate sources. First, I read "The Importance of Being Earnest," the wittiest play ever written in the English language. Second, there was Monty Python's Oscar Wilde sketch, where Wilde, James McNeil Whistler and George Bernard Shaw force each other to turn insults into compliments for the Prince of Wales. Third, there was the "Masterpiece Theater" mini-series "Lillie," in which Peter Egan played Wilde and where for the first time I heard the speech from Wilde's court case where he explains "the love that dare not speak its name." It is one of the most unforgettable declarations from the docket in human history and I think I just about have it memorized because it was really burned into my mind the first time I heard it. When I watched "Wilde," my knowledge and understanding of Oscar Wilde was extended in several key ways. In playing the title role actor Stephen Fry makes Wilde seem less the dandy and more the kindly man he must have been to be put in the situation that caused his down fall. In contrast, Lord Alfred Douglas (Jude Law), known as "Bosie," might be beautiful of face but it is most decidedly skin deep. He is an ugly human being and when Wilde does what he does out of the goodness of his heart, the tragedy that it is for somebody who does not deserve it. I had not really thought much of Bosie before, but after watching "Wilde" I consider him a most despicable figure. Wilde was in prison within three months after the opening of "The Importance of Being Earnest," and the thought of what has been lost to literature and drama is rather sickening. It is only in the film's final scene that for the first time I found myself thinking of Oscar Wilde as a pathetic figure, and again it was because of Bosie. I had long appreciated the irony that despite his homosexuality Wilde truly loved his wife Constance (Jennifer Ehle), but in Julian Mitchell's screenplay, based on Richard Ellmann's noted biography, I learn an even greater irony with regards to Wilde's downfall, namely that his physical relationship with Bosie had been of short duration and that they were not lovers at the time of the libel suit involving the Marquess of Queensberry (Tom Wilkinson). In that regard this 1997 film enhances the tragic aspects of the story. Of course, the essence of the tragedy is articulated by Wilde himself, who declares: "In this life there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants. The other is getting it."
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful looking and sounding, and heartbreaking as well
Review: This movie is everything about why I love the courageous, crisp, brainy and brilliant British media. Stephen Fry is a gem who could recite the phone book and turn it into a soliloquy on the cruelty of human history. His voice is marvelous, and he rolls his consonants around in his mouth like Jordan almonds -- all without affectation, somehow. Wilde's many quips and epigrams drop out of his mouth without the slightest artificiality, natural and thoughtless as dew rolling off a leaf. Jude Law's Bosie is terrifyingly unstable, and his beauty serves only to throw his instability into high relief. You can't take your eyes off of him while he's on screen at the same time you want to turn away and skitter under the cabinets to stop watching. The rest of the supporting cast is magnificent (if only the American film industry permitted its great actresses to work past the age of 40, we might boast such luminaries as Vanessa Redgrave and Zoe Wanamaker someday as well as Helen Mirren and Judi Dench!), the directing is flawless, the costumes and set design stunning but never overstated. All of it is used only to support the story, and as beautiful as it all is, it never pulls you out of the story or distracts you, only providing a seamless and textured foundation for the action. I admit, I'm somewhat amused at the reviewers who imagine that this film shouldn't have concentrated so much on Wilde's sexuality. This is the story of him as much his work -- and his work at any rate was quite informed by his sexuality, nebulous at best during a time when anything but rigid adherence to a particularly joyless version of heterosexuality was a sin and a crime. Beautiful as this film is (and delicious as it is to see so many gorgeous young British men running around au naturel), it breaks your heart with the realization that happiness and fulfillment in life, as well as success and self-respect, can be so profoundly influenced by nothing more significant than the year in which one was born. In a hundred years, what will people be saying about the great women, gays and lesbians, and other minorities who lived in our time?
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