Review of Cassandra's Dream (2007) by Christopher H — 25 Feb 2010

A definite Woody Allen dog, it's no wonder why this one was pronounced D.O.A. Perhaps the rustiest nail in the coffin is an abysmal performance by Colin Farrell, cast correctly but totally unfocused. I don't know if he was embroiled in the throes of his well-known cocaine habit or what, but he seems glassy-eyed and inexpressive here, just barely coming to life by the melodramatic ending. It doesn't exactly help that his character has exactly three lines ("I like to gamble," "we shouldn't do this," "we shouldn't have done that"), but watching him made the movie a totally difficult sell for me. Ewan McGregor isn't offensive, and I'll watch any movie where he whips out the tits, but he isn't exactly bringing much to the table either as a listless intellectual. Though his performance is adequate, there really isn't any interesting ground for him to cover. Finally, Hayley Atwell, who I'm guessing was an aborted Woody Allen muse in the making, is pretty awful herself. No surprises as to why her career vanished like it did, as her presence is broad and easy and she lays her character flat in about thirty seconds, though that may also be the script cheapening her. I know these characters are not supposed to be sympathetic, but instead of wanting to slap them and yell some sense into them, I really just wanted to shut the movie off. My frustration was outside this insular, dull universe Allen had created. The two figures who emerge unscathed are Sally Hawkins, luminous and heartbreaking as Farrell's trivialized girlfriend, and Tom Wilkinson, who is chewing the scenery but at least he's doing something. It becomes tragically clear who the real actors in the cast are and who's just along for the ride.

Actors aside, there's not much they could have done for this ridiculously pat morality play, where absolutely nothing worth noting is going on except Philip Glass' cool score. The movie strings you along on generic conflict after generic conflict, when finally it decides that an end has been reached and it sweeps everything under the rug in a mostly hilarious fashion. Not only is it rushed, but it's a complete and total dud. Unless you're an absolute Allen diehard, there's no reason to see Cassandra's Dream if you've seen a heist flick or something more complicated than Transformers 2 in the last five years.