Con’s Score:2.5 Shades of Grey
This film draws together a range of acting legends in this story of four older women who are life-long friends
Writer-director Bill Holderman has drawn together a range of acting legends for this film, about four life-long friends who get together every month for their book club. Funny, as I thought a book club brings together a random group of people with a love of books, but let’s not let details get in the way of these four stories.
The four characters could have been drawn from Sex in the City. Vivian (Jane Fonda) is the lush who owns a hotel. Sharon (Candice Bergen) is a Supreme Court judge, and the conservative one. Diane (Diane Keaton) is lost and insecure after losing her husband, and Carol (Mary Steenburgen) is in a happy marriage that has lost its passion. The book for this month… Fifty Shades of Grey! Prepare for lots of lewd puns and wink-winks.
The book seems to set off lots of introspection and love lines. Carol stumbles across an old flame, Marty (Don Johnson, sporting the same haircut). Diane meets a dream guy Mitchell (Andy Garcia) in a flight and accidentally grabs him, Trump-style. Sharon dates Roy Schrieder and the guy from Dinner with Andre. and Carol slips her hubby, Bruce (Craig T Nelson) a Viagra, which leads to a funny police scene. Even Alicia Silverstone makes an appearance.
I’m not sure why. This script is hardly ground breaking, and the humour is as old as the characters. If I met these people at a party, I’d move on due to boredom. Many of the scenes are slapstick and the lines are as edgy as a football. It feels like hanging out with Nanna.
The acting is all over the place. Garcia smirks the whole time, happy at being paid to kiss Keaton, although it’s a nice change having the older man-young female dynamic reversed. Fonda seems to miss her timing, and there’s overlapping conversation which felt sloppy instead of natural. They’re all talented enough to pull it off (pardon the pun, and that’s the sort of dialogue that fills this movie) but it’s hardly great acting.
There are still many great lines (“He could be a serial killer” “Well, no man is perfect.”) and it will delight its audience: women over 60, which have never been catered for. I found it hard to empathise with rich upper-class white women who can talk aimlessly for hours and whose greatest challenge is their next shag. I guess the flower power generation are getting their second wind, but I wouldn’t want to accidentally walk in on them. Take your Mum… then sneak out and leave her there.
Con Nats- Theatre Now
