btm1 I found this film on the MPLEX Chanel TV listings of Comcast Xfinity. The listing gave it just 2 of 4 stars, but as a history buff I found the description blurb compelling: "Intriguing love story, set in 1936 Shanghai, in which a disillusioned blind diplomat (Ralph Fiennes) falls for a ruined Russian royal (Natasha Richardson) working as a B-girl. Richardson's mother, Vanessa Redgrave, and aunt, Lynn Redgrave, costar."I set my DVR to record it a while back but just got around to watching it I am writing this review to protest the 2-star rating of the listing. Maybe its not 4-star, but it deserves at least 3-star. Richardson's Countess' job is more correctly labeled as a "taxi dancer" in a cabaret-bar, not a "bar girl." But in 1936 it is still a disgraceful job in the minds of her mother, aunt and sister-in-law, who live with her and are supported by her earnings, but still pretend their royal birth entitles them to a better life. This becomes significant late in the film. Fiennes' character has given up any pretense of using his reputation as a top American diplomat for the stodgy respectable company that pays his salary, and dreams of one-day owning a cabaret of his own with just the right amount of tension between internationally diverse clientèle, a select group of bouncers, the right entertainment, and the ideal elegant but sad woman to set the sexual atmosphere. He wants to live in his dream bar and shut out the messy real world outside.

elle_kittyca I wanted to like this movie, given the cast, the time period of it, and the decent IMDb rating. I see someone gave it ten stars. Sadly, it is another case of a movie being too highly rated in my opinion. There were several problems with this movie. First, the pace was so slow and the premises were mostly unbelievable. Perhaps one could believe that a blind diplomat could start a nightclub with a woman he has never seen(after conveniently winning money to do so), but has some sort of idealized fantasy about. But their relationship and non-relationship is convoluted and makes little sense. He is her employer and a patron in some way, and they are also friends, ...sort of...in so far as she is not allowed to discuss her home life and things that make break the mental illusion he has of her. If anyone had such a relationship, its hard to imagine that it would be spoken of. I love Ralph Fiennes. He usually has such a capacity for depth and nuance. I did not believe in this character, however, or what he was trying to achieve. It was Ralph being himself, without there being much character development. I found him the entire enterprise uninteresting. I couldn't even recommend this film as something a Ralph Fiennes fan should see in order to admire his performance. Of slightly more interest was Natasha Richardson's character, who I at least found interesting and inspired some sympathy. However, for most of the film, nothing developed in her circumstances. Despite my love of historical drama, I would not recommend this.

arturus This, the last of the Merchant/Ivory collaborations, is a long, rich and well-crafted film, a fitting finale to the collaboration of these two. It is perhaps a little too long and doesn't quite fit together, but the rich visuals, the intriguing characters, the evocation of time and place, the richly effective musical score and the fine, nuanced acting pull you right in and keep you watching, just as all of their films have done.As I say, one of the strengths of the film is the acting, by the Redgraves, mother, daughter and aunt; by the supporting cast, and by the lead actor. The Redgrave sisters, Vanessa and Lynn, give a splendid evocation of exiled Russians, perhaps from the experience of playing Chekov. Venessa's daughter Richardson is less successful: though she is beautiful and intriguing in the part, her attempt at a Russian accent is really awful.Fiennes gives an insightful performance as a recently blinded man who has lost his family under tragic circumstances. I had blind parents, grew up around blind people and am legally blind myself (partially sighted) so I must say that though his interior life is spot on, his playing "blind" is really inaccurate and unbelievable, both as the character in unfamiliar and in familiar surroundings. This may be partially the fault of the screenplay. First, a small detail: no blind person can eat with chopsticks. It's impossible! Secondly, his inconsistent use of a walking stick as a cane. A short stick like that would give him next to no information concerning what is in front of him and would be essentially useless, except as a prop; as an actor, Fiennes' use of it is inconsistent and not accurate. Third, when the character expresses a desire to "see" the Countess's face by feeling it...well, I'm sorry, but NO blind person does that! In fact the idea is quite abhorrent, even offensive to us. This only happens in the movies and it provides one of the few false moments in the picture.The other false moment is his mad dash through the crowded Shanghai streets to find the Countess. It is wildly melodramatic, way over the top and unbelievable. Again, this is the screenplay's fault. Fiennes tries to downplay the melodrama by underplaying, but it still comes across as false.My other problem with Fiennes' performance is that he plays the character as a modern American man, not as an upper class American of that time, much too, well, "Kevin Kostner". This character is upper class with money, an American diplomat. If this were a 1930s picture I CAN imagine an Englishman playing him, but he would be more like Ronald Colman or Robert Donat. If an American of that time were to play this character, he would be Tyrone Power, not Humphrey Bogart. Though Bogart did in fact come from an upper class New York family, he almost never played that in the movies.Among modern American actors, I think only Kevin Kline could play this character accurately, with the right speech and manner, as a well educated, upper class American of the early 20th century. Most other American actors of his generation just lack the technique to pull it off.Within the choices he made, Fiennes does very well. His American accent is quite consistent and very good, though occasionally he speaks his lines using English "speech melody" rather than authentic American intonations.Overall, I found this to be a satisfying picture, telling a good story on a large, rich canvas, in the Merchant/Ivory tradition, a fitting ending to their collaboration.

[email protected] POSSIBLE SPOILERSLike most Merchant-Ivory films, "The White Countess" is set in an exotic location (in this case Shanghai in the mid-1930's on the verge of the Japanese invasion), and it proceeds at a leisurely pace. Again, like most Merchant-Ivory films, it has an excellent cast: Ralph Fiennes as a blind American ex-diplomat, Natasha Richardson as the title character, and Lynn Redgrave and Vanessa Redgrave as members of her Russian émigré family who are ashamed of the fact that she is earning money (which they are glad enough to accept) as a "dance hall girl" and presumed prostitute. The problem here is that the leisurely pace slows to a crawl and the events leading up to the Japanese takeover are observed at a distance through the interaction of Fiennes with a Japanese diplomat/spy/advance man played by Hiroyuki Sanada. Fiennes has opened his own bar/gathering place with race track winnings and named it The White Countess after the hostess he has hired away from another establishment. Sanada's character -- Matsuda -- helps Fiennes create the political tension that he considers necessary for his place to be successful. Although they are the principals, neither Fiennes nor Richardson distinguish themselves particularly, and Lynn and Vanessa Redgrave are strictly secondary characters. Sanada is, in my opinion, the most successful actor in the entire movie. That's another way of saying that the main story is utterly unconvincing and the principal actors seem merely to have gone through the motions. Neither Fiennes nor Richardson made me care about what is happening to their characters. The Japanese enter the city, the émigrés flee to an undetermined fate. Perhaps the book was more engrossing.