COMMENTARY

movie reviews Cold Mountain: As a movie, it’s a mixed bag but I’d definitely say it’s worth watching — it was hard to care about the two main characters as a couple, but I did care about them, and many of the supporting characters, as individuals. The costumes (which is what we’re REALLY interested in here) were beautiful — Nicole Kidman’s early outfits especially really LOOK 1860s. Perfect bell hoops, lots of nice gauzy cotton prints, at least one dress with a fan front.

Kidman’s hats irritated me, but I don’t think it’s because they’re not period — I think it’s because I just don’t feel she is right for the period. She’s SO thin that she looks like a stick wearing a hoopskirt and she needs to lay off the plastic surgery — see Jewel (who is suprisingly NOT painful) in Ride with the Devil for an actress who just looks right in 1860s. Renee Zellweger was convincing in her “I don’t give a hoot what I look like” loose-fitting outfits, but BOTH actresses drove me ABSOLUTELY CRAZY with their hair. Okay, yes, Zellweger’s character didn’t seem to care much what she looked like, but given that, wouldn’t it be more functional to have all of your hair back in a tight braid or a bun so that it’s out of the way while you’re mucking around in the dirt? And yes, Kidman’s character increasingly cared less what SHE looked like, but if her extensions waved around in the breeze one more time, I was really going to have to hurt her. Functional = out of the face. Irritating = carefully dishevelled, lots of loose hair hanging in your face.

Mona Lisa Smile: Another mixed bag as a movie, but also worth watching imho — again, I cared a whole lot more about the supporting characters than I did for annoying Julia Roberts. Roberts is supposed to be a bohemian, which I guess her costumes portrayed well enough given the constraints of the period (ooo look! she’s wearing turquoise!) — but Roberts is SUCH a modern actress and really doesn’t do well in period films. Her hair was particularly modern looking to me (“oh no! can’t mess with the Julia Roberts mane!”). OTOH, many of the college women (especially Julia Stiles and Ginnifer Goodwin as Constance) looked just fabulous — Goodwin’s and Stiles’s hairstyles especially! I loved the poofy blue bridesmaid dresses, the pencil skirts, and Roberts’s brown taffeta party dress.

Next up — Girl with a Pearl Earring!