by Brendan Foley
Two Cents
Two Cents is an original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team will program films and contribute our best, most insightful, or most creative thoughts on each film using a maximum of 200 words each. Guest writers and fan comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future entries to the column. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion.
The Pick
“What do Two Cents do? Shine.”
Did you know that you could go on Netflix right now and watch a movie where Daredevil and Superman sword fight?
Largely ignored on release in 2007, Stardust, adapted from Neil Gaiman’s novel (itself adapted from an ‘illustrated novel’ he created with legendary artist Charles Vess) has developed a cult following over the years, winning audiences old and young with its blend of swashbuckling adventure, farcical comedy, and swooning romance.
Stardust proved to be a launching ground for some of the most prominent talent in today’s Hollywood, both in front of and behind the camera. You’ve got Ol’ Horn-head, Charlie Cox, as clumsy hero Tristan Thorn, and soon-to-be-Emmy-anointed Claire Danes as the fallen star that Tristan attempts to capture from the fantasy world. Stick around and you’ll find Henry ‘I coulda been a great Superman if it weren’t for these fucking scripts’ Cavill as a romantic rival of Tristan’s, Sienna Miller as the village beauty that inspires the entire mad affair, and a then-unknown Mark Strong as the delightfully homicidal Prince Septimus.
Oh, and the movie comes loaded with veteran stars tearing into the craziest material, including Robert de Niro as a seemingly-gruff lightning pirate, Michelle Pfeiffer as a cackling witch, plus cameos by Rupert Everett, Ricky Gervais, and Peter O’Toole, plus plus character actor treasures like Jason Flemyng, Dexter Fletcher and Spaced‘s Mark Heap.
Behind the camera you’ll find Matthew Vaughn, in only his second feature as director. After introducing the world to the steel-eyed charisma of Daniel Craig in the vicious crime thriller Layer Cake, Vaughn flirted with blockbuster franchises like X-Men (he almost directed The Last Stand, before ducking out of the way of that particular bullet, Neo-style) and an early version of Thor. Instead, Vaughn teamed with Jane Goldman (his screenwriting partner in perpetuity ever since [Goldman also went solo to write films like The Woman in Black) and fashioned a fantasy utterly unlike anything anyone else was making.
Stardust may not have set the world on fire on initial release, but we can now look back at the film as a singular collection of talent, a film where the old guard and the new class dove into wild and wacky fantasy together. Its stars would go on to be benchmarks in comic book films, prestige TV, and the Netflix original programming boom, movements that define this current age of media.
So let’s look back at Stardust, and talk about whether or not it still shines.
Did you get a chance to watch along with us this week? Want to recommend a great (or not so great) film for the whole gang to cover? Comment below or post on our Facebook or hit us up on Twitter!
Next Week’s Pick:
Purple Rain.
You know why.
It’s not streaming on Netflix, but can be rented from the usual places including Amazon.
Would you like to be a guest in next week’s Two Cents column? Simply watch and send your under-200-word review to twocents(at)cinapse.co!
Our Guests
Brendan Agnew: Okay Hollywood, take notice — when you get it in your silly head that you’re going to adapt a Neil Gaiman story, you don’t do it half-assed. You don’t cut corners and you don’t phone it in. You do it up right, like Matthew Vaughn’s Stardust.
For anyone who knows Vaughn from his darker-edged fare like Kingsman or Kick-Ass (even his X-Men movie gets pretty damn nasty), this may seem like something of an oddity. And it is, but deliberately so. Vaughn dives into the Neil Gaiman/Charles Vess tale so completely that an offhanded reference to an airship in the book becomes a a full crew of lightning pirates led by none other than Robert “You talkin’ to me?” DeNiro (absolutely *crushing* a, shall we say, flamboyant mentor role as Captain Shakespeare). Stardust is a double line of wicked whimsy, powdered and cut just right to be charming and romantic, swashbuckling and terrifying, and just plain odd whenever it damn well pleases.
And that’s part of the alchemy that makes it work so well and hold up so beautifully. In a world of epic fantasy sagas and endless franchises, Stardust is a consummately confident one-off that throws in plots and characters like kitchen sinks were going out of style, but pulls everything together so neatly that you can’t help but admire it.
Oh, and Michelle Pfeiffer is the sexiest wicked crone you’ve ever seen.
[Mr. Agnew actually co-hosts a podcast that only a couple weeks ago did an episode focusing on Stardust and its spiritual brethren, The Princess Bride. You can listen to that HERE, though be warned that their guest is kind of an idiot who giggles too much.] (@BLCAgnew)
Jaime Burchardt: Before directing some controversies (Kick-Ass and Kingsman), way back when, Matthew Vaughn brought the world a sweet, lovely film. Well, a sweet and lovely film pertaining to his styles, but still welcome nonetheless. Stardust was a part of 2007’s fantasy escape from mega blockbusters and the reassertion of film noir. However, unlike Enchanted and The Golden Compass, Vaughn’s sophomore effort felt personal, like a children’s story that was lost for eons, only to be found and told through an eager soul (it’s fascinating to see how Neil Gaiman’s works effect filmmakers). The entire cast is divine (pretty partial to Pfeiffer, Strong and De Niro), the writing is solid and it has one of my favorite pirate fight scenes ever. If you haven’t seen Stardust yet, rectify that today. (@jaimeburchardt)
The Team
Frank: It’s impossible to describe just how much I adore this movie. As an eternal Pfeiffer-phile and a fan of Neil Gaiman, this was a match made in heaven for me. But the joy of Stardust exists far beyond the pairing of one of my favorite books with my all-time movie star crush. This film is the very example of the kind of summer blockbuster that populated the multiplex when I was a child before the superhero universe bullied such films to the sidelines. Stardust has everything a moviegoer could possibly want: fantasy, romance, comedy, action and the kind of charm that can only be found in the truest of escapist fare.
I don’t know which aspect of the film I love most. There’s the incredibly lush score, the extremely well-written script, the crazy assortment of actors, the dazzling effects, the well-timed and edited sequences (the one at Lamia’s inn being my favorite), or the dreamy Take That song “Rule the World,” which closes the film. I think what I love about Stardust most of all, is its sensibilities. Other films with Stardust’s pedigree are made for children, oftentimes leaving their parents stranded and bored. Here, the filmmakers closely echoed the spirit of Gaiman’s text with its grown-up motifs and have, in-turn, made a fairy tale for adults who long to recapture the magical feeling movies gave them as kids, while acknowledging that they have indeed aged. And of course, there’s also Pfeiffer. (@frankfilmgeek)
Jon:LOVE Stardust. (@Texas_Jon)
Brendan: If you grew a movie in a lab to appeal to me, Stardust would be it. Swashbuckling adventure, fantasy madness, black comedy, tender romance, and that special brand of ivy-fanged absurdism that the British are so adept at, everything is mashed together into a two-hour sprint of pure glee that is Stardust. I bought the movie sight-unseen back in 2007, determined to see it simply on virtue of it being adapted from Neil Gaiman, a writer I adore. I fell in love with the movie pretty much from the second Ian McKellen’s narration started (note: if you want me to be on board with your movie, put Gandalf in it) and immediately began showing it to friends and family. I have yet to encounter a person who, having seen Stardust, didn’t love it absolutely. I am forced to conclude that people who dislike this film must just be shitty people.
Don’t be shitty people. Go watch Stardust.
(@TheTrueBrendanF)
Austin:What a terrific and inspiring movie. What a beautiful fairy tale. What an absolute pleasure.
This is my first viewing of Stardust. It flew under my radar on its release, or perhaps I just didn’t notice it, unaware of the Neil Gaiman connection and mistaking it for a chick flick or YA-type nonsense (misconceptions that its poster/cover art do little to deter). But it’s certainly worked up a favorable reputation over the years, enough to me to take notice and program it for Two Cents — I’m ecstatic I did.
The cast is wonderful. I was surprised to see a lot of great character actors that I love, and even more surprised later at the actors I didn’t recognize (I was baffled by Brendan’s Daredevil vs Superman references in the opening. At first I was like, “Wha?” and then I was all “WHAAA!”). As a star fallen from the heavens, it’s Claire Danes’ job to make the audience fall in love with her, and she makes it tremendously easy (the glowing thing helped, too). The script is surprisingly hilarious, and the many humorous moments add levity to an already joyous film that mixes magical fantasy, romance, and a hero’s saga into one glorious, rollicking treat.
My only real criticism is that the film gets unnecessarily hard on Tristan’s first crush, Victoria, towards the end. Even Tristan himself is rude to her in a way that’s grotesque and inconsistent with his kindness. She is certainly shallow, manipulative, and unappreciative to a fault, but nevertheless she was also his friend — the only one that we know of, in fact — and didn’t earn such scorn. I mean, she’s not much different than Spider-Man’s Mary Jane. Real talk. (@VforVashaw)
Did you all get a chance to watch along with us? Share your thoughts with us here in the comments or on Twitter or Facebook!