Review of Charlotte Gray (2001) by Bill T — 22 Jul 2015

Always interesting to watch, Cate Blanchett does her best here, and it's set up as a spy adventure romance.

Solid acting, decent script, and incredible locations with an evenly set intensity create a good film set during WWII.

But, it's undone by some things that make it appealing:

-beautiful cinematography makes it seem glossy and almost dreamlike,.

-filmed entirely in English with few accents makes it a bit emotionally hollow,.

-the strong dramatic performances are well pitched yet come across as slick here, and.

-despite the underpinnings of wartime intensity this is light and bloodless for a war movie.

It could have been marketed as a tween romance and maybe rivaled the later vapid vampire craze, but I need to emphasize the acting is superb here, yet tainted by some of its other elements.

Worth a look.

3 out of 5.