In some ways this is an amazing five star film. In others, it’s a bit below par. The visual aesthetics are pretty sublime. The style of acting, whist admittedly funny, is so mannered as to oscillate between charming and annoying.
The ensemble cast, headed up by Ralph Fiennes, is incredible. But, as with the hyper mannered m.o. of the entire film, this is both a strength and a weakness.
The plot, convoluted and bizarre – Byzantine seems an apt term – really is, the McGuffin of McGuffins. And once again that speaks to the schizoid tendencies of this film. It’s simultaneously brilliant and rather pointless or meaningless.
Can a film be nothing more than an assemblage or collage of pretty or amusing tableaux? That’s essentially what this is. In a way, this makes it a perfect expression – and a frightening, almost damning condemnation- of our times.
As art it’s stunningly beautiful. And as a kind of love letter to art itself, and even a whole melange of certain types of art, architecture, even culture, it’s terrific.
But despite its frothy weightless beauty there’s a cold vacuity in there as well, as regards the lost or vanished but perhaps always imaginary world it conjures up. As a kind of orgy of aestheticism it becomes detached from any form or reality.