Stardust - Preview & US reaction
Preview by Jack Foley
STARDUST, based on the best-selling graphic novel by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess, opened in fourth place at the American box office at the weekend (August 10-12) despite good reviews.
The star-studded fantasy takes audiences on an adventure that begins in a village in England and ends up in places that exist in an imaginary world.
It focuses on a young man named Tristan (played by newcomer Charlie Cox) as he tries to win the heart of Victoria (Sienna Miller), the beautiful but cold object of his desire, by going on a quest to retrieve a fallen star.
During his odyssey, Tristan finds the star, which has transformed into a striking girl named Yvaine (Claire Danes). But he’s not the only one seeking it.
A king’s (Peter O’Toole) four living sons – not to mention the ghosts of their three dead brothers – all need the star as they vie for the throne.
And Tristan must also overcome the evil witch Lamia (Michelle Pfeiffer) who needs the star to make her young again.
As Tristan battles to survive these threats, encountering a pirate named Captain Shakespeare (Robert De Niro) and a shady trader named Ferdy the Fence (Ricky Gervais) along the way, his quest changes – he must now win the heart of the star for himself as he discovers the meaning of true love.
Despite the disappointing box office, critics mostly warmed to the movie. Time Out, for instance, wrote: “The antic spirit of The Princess Bride looms large over Stardust, creatively adapted from Neil Gaiman’s much more sober 1998 graphic novel. That’s probably a good call.*
While The Los Angeles Times wrote: “With its heart worn proudly on its sleeve, it’s one of the best date movies of the year, a compatibility litmus test for starry-eyed romantics.”
And the New York Times opined: “The movie assumes that its churning energy, lightened with whimsy, will carry the day. And, to an extent, it does.*
The Hollywood Reporter, meanwhile, referred to it as “a magical adult fairy tale*, and the Globe And Mail wrote that “for audiences tired of summer sequels that grind through the familiar motions, Stardust provides a dizzying antidote”.
Some were less impressed, such as Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times, who wrote: “There are lots of good things in the movie, but they play more like vaudeville acts than part of a coherent plot. It’s a film you enjoy in pieces, but the jigsaw never gets solved.”
And Newsweek, which added: “Vaughn, who made the enjoyably tricky gangster movie Layer Cake, gets points for ambition, but this antic fantasy eludes his grasp.”
But the final word goes to the Houston Chronicle which concluded: “No, Stardust isn’t a children’s movie. It’s a movie for anyone, of any age, who believes in magic – or wishes they did.”
UK audiences can decide for themselves when the film opens on October 19, 2007.