Review of Chéri (2009) by Silvia O — 24 May 2009

Michelle Pfeiffer is terrific as Lea, the semi-retired courtesan who begins an affair with her friend's son; she projects sophisticated sensuality so powerfully that it's easy to believe that the young, handsome but spoilt and shallow Cheri would fall in love with her. Kathy Bates is also great as the boozy Madame Peloux, a veteran of the same line of work, who cheerfully accepts her boy's surprising choice of lover - until she decides that she wants a grandchild, at which point conflict and unhappiness ensue.

It all looks very elegant, and there are some lovely costumes in this drama, but the passage of time has taken away some of the point of Collette's story. When the novels on which this film is based were published in the 1920s, it was presumably fairly outrageous to write sympathetically about upmarket prostitutes and their offspring; now, these pampered characters seem less interesting. However, the whole thing has an appealing lush romanticism, and Pfeiffer really does take hold of the role (and Rupert Friend's Cheri) with great grace and gusto.