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Derek Malcolm's rating
Cheri needs more depth
By
Derek Malcolm
11 Feb 2009
If looks could kill, Stephen Frears and Christopher Hampton’s adaptation of Colette’s Cheri might cause casualties. Production design and art direction sum up La Belle Epoque stunningly. Yet this story of a young man (Rupert Friend) who realises too late that he is desperately in love with Michelle Pfeiffer’s ageing courtesan after marrying for money carries within it the seeds of its own destruction. It is sometimes too smart and stylish for its own good.
Surprisingly, Frears voices the commentary, presumably also written by Hampton, and as director, he gets eloquent performances from Pfeiffer, Friend, who looks more and more like a handsome debauchee, and Kathy Bates, as a rich old whore trying to marry her recalcitrant son off. It’s an intrguingly made film but I seem to remember Colette had a bit more depth than this.
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