A preview that I found here -> www.hollywoodreporter.com
It doesn't sound good ...
Chromophobia
By Kirk Honeycutt
Bottom line: Caught forlornly between satire and drama, Martha Fiennes cannot rescue her characters from her own distaste for most of them.
CANNES -- With the precision of a sharp, cold surgical knife, Martha Fiennes dissects her characters in "Chromophobia." Save for one sentimental subplot, the writer-director clearly doesn't care for these people very much. Nor is there much reason for viewers to care, either. The strangely chilly melodrama-cum-satire made an odd choice for the closing night film at the Festival de Cannes. Its strong cast probably ensures North American distributor interest, but this misanthropic take on neurotics in the British professional class will certainly challenge marketers.
The married couple around whom subplots swirl is fast-rising attorney Marcus Aylesbury (Damian Lewis), the son of a distinguished judge (Ian Holm), and his anxious wife Iona (Kristen Scott Thomas). Having been made a partner in a powerful London law firm, Marcus finds himself drawn into an illegal scheme by his boss. Meanwhile, Iona, who suffers from low self-esteem and sexual frustration, deals with her dissatisfactions through a shrink and shopping sprees for clothes and modern art. Her new worry is that their hyperactive, small son might be spending too much time with his gay godfather, Stephen (Ralph Fiennes).
Marcus runs into an old mate from his youthful days in a rock band, Trent Masters (Ben Chaplin), who is now a tabloid journalist. When Marcus drunkenly confides in Trent about his firm's corrupt dealings, Trent can't help investigate a story that could make him a media star.
Meanwhile, in a maudlin and seemingly unrelated story that only connects -- and unconvincingly so -- to the main one later in the movie, ex-cop-turned-social worker Colin (Rhys Ifans) becomes emotionally involved the lives of his only seeming case, that of a seriously ill prostitute (Penelope Cruz) and her beloved small daughter.
Much of what you need to know about the characters -- or, to be precise, about how Fiennes feels about them -- can be gleaned from the production design. Fiennes and her designer Tony Burrough give the married bourgeois couple a sleek, severely modern and ultimately soulless house. At times, when the camera glides down sterile hallways or peers at characters through walls of glass, you can almost feel the director mock her characters.
The judge and his wife occupy a country manor stuffed with the furnishings of satisfied privilege, while Stephen's townhouse brims with lovingly collected art fastidiously displayed. Only the character who inhabits scruffy digs, meaning the prostitute, does the director's attitude soften. Soften, unfortunately, to the point of sentimental mush.
The acting is crisp, but no one's plight in this turgid soap opera gets through to you. Having dissed her characters for more than half the movie, Fiennes cannot turn things around and ask an audience suddenly to sympathize with their predicaments.
Tech credits are certainly pro but insulate the film's characters behind the well-upholstered trappings of wealth and privilege. And what on earth does it mean for the credits to insist that the film's cinematographer, George Tiffin, provided "additional screenplay material?"
...
Also I found the trailer ... you can watch it here -> Chromophobia !
It doesn't sound good ...
Chromophobia
By Kirk Honeycutt
Bottom line: Caught forlornly between satire and drama, Martha Fiennes cannot rescue her characters from her own distaste for most of them.
CANNES -- With the precision of a sharp, cold surgical knife, Martha Fiennes dissects her characters in "Chromophobia." Save for one sentimental subplot, the writer-director clearly doesn't care for these people very much. Nor is there much reason for viewers to care, either. The strangely chilly melodrama-cum-satire made an odd choice for the closing night film at the Festival de Cannes. Its strong cast probably ensures North American distributor interest, but this misanthropic take on neurotics in the British professional class will certainly challenge marketers.
The married couple around whom subplots swirl is fast-rising attorney Marcus Aylesbury (Damian Lewis), the son of a distinguished judge (Ian Holm), and his anxious wife Iona (Kristen Scott Thomas). Having been made a partner in a powerful London law firm, Marcus finds himself drawn into an illegal scheme by his boss. Meanwhile, Iona, who suffers from low self-esteem and sexual frustration, deals with her dissatisfactions through a shrink and shopping sprees for clothes and modern art. Her new worry is that their hyperactive, small son might be spending too much time with his gay godfather, Stephen (Ralph Fiennes).
Marcus runs into an old mate from his youthful days in a rock band, Trent Masters (Ben Chaplin), who is now a tabloid journalist. When Marcus drunkenly confides in Trent about his firm's corrupt dealings, Trent can't help investigate a story that could make him a media star.
Meanwhile, in a maudlin and seemingly unrelated story that only connects -- and unconvincingly so -- to the main one later in the movie, ex-cop-turned-social worker Colin (Rhys Ifans) becomes emotionally involved the lives of his only seeming case, that of a seriously ill prostitute (Penelope Cruz) and her beloved small daughter.
Much of what you need to know about the characters -- or, to be precise, about how Fiennes feels about them -- can be gleaned from the production design. Fiennes and her designer Tony Burrough give the married bourgeois couple a sleek, severely modern and ultimately soulless house. At times, when the camera glides down sterile hallways or peers at characters through walls of glass, you can almost feel the director mock her characters.
The judge and his wife occupy a country manor stuffed with the furnishings of satisfied privilege, while Stephen's townhouse brims with lovingly collected art fastidiously displayed. Only the character who inhabits scruffy digs, meaning the prostitute, does the director's attitude soften. Soften, unfortunately, to the point of sentimental mush.
The acting is crisp, but no one's plight in this turgid soap opera gets through to you. Having dissed her characters for more than half the movie, Fiennes cannot turn things around and ask an audience suddenly to sympathize with their predicaments.
Tech credits are certainly pro but insulate the film's characters behind the well-upholstered trappings of wealth and privilege. And what on earth does it mean for the credits to insist that the film's cinematographer, George Tiffin, provided "additional screenplay material?"
...
Also I found the trailer ... you can watch it here -> Chromophobia !
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I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve"
I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve"
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