Review of Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003) by Jonathan B — 09 Jan 2011

I really wanted to like this movie more than I did. Great cast, beautifully filmed and interesting story but the ending, or lack of really lets it down. I feel as though there was more to learn about all of the people depicted and was left unsatisfied.

The basic premise that Vermeer's wife was insecure, his daughter was a horrible bitch, his mother a tight fisted schemer, his patron a dirty old man and his muse an innocent servant all make for an interesting mix of ingredients but the whole somehow left me unsatisfied.

Colin Firth plays the genius artist role well but the script lets him down. I don't actually know whether this story sees him as a philanderer, manipulator or just an obsessive. Similarly, Scarlett Johansson as Griet, the young servant that Vermeer paints, acts her little socks off but is given no real character development. Rather than participating in the story, she just seems to endure it, putting up with character assassination, physical abuse and excessive workload with pouty aloofness. The only relief to this comes when she smacks Vermeer's poisonous daughter about the face, something she should have done much sooner. Even her love interest with local butcher's boy Cillian Murphy develops to nothing more than running along the canal and giggling.

Watching this movie is a little akin to boiling a kettle and taking it off the heat prematurely. There's much pent up emotion and feeling that just isn't given expression. I just feel there was more of a story to tell.