!(imgcenter)http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2008/1762620008_e68a2d4847_o.jpg(Stardust)!
Have been unavoidably detained by the world.
Expect us when you see us.
At the risk of sounding like a biased fangirl, I have to say that I enjoyed the movie very much.
I loved the book and even though the movie did not capture the full intensity of the book’s magical mystery (not many movie adaptations can make that claim), it was a truly delightful journey.
Much credit has to be given to Robert di Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer, who filled up the screen with their charisma. In his campiest and most outlandish role ever, di Niro has completely outdone himself and really, one can never look at him the same way again. The luminous Pfeiffer, on the other hand, vamped it up as the evil witch-queen who is bent on carving out Yvaine’s heart. Her obsessive vanity and incessant rage were brilliantly showcased in that slowly decaying body.
It helped, too, that they had the gravitas to carry their characters through much of the movie, which was slightly unwieldy. Charlie Cox was pleasant (and really cute!) in his role as Tristan Thorne, the boy who went off on a fool’s errand but he came across as bland and single dimensional. Claire Danes was beautiful as the star but I was slightly miffed that her happy-go-lucky character was not the despairing, sharp-tongued fallen star of Neil Gaiman’s creation.
Movies being movies, the screenwriters had tweaked a large part of the original storyline. The ending has been modified into a saccharine sweet, typical Disney movie denouement. But it took away the edginess that Gaiman is known for – the bittersweet fact that Yvaine had to live forever in loneliness after losing her one true love to mortality is one reason why the story resonates and feels so real.
But overall, I loved the feel of the movie, as superficial as it was. It made me miss the feeling of falling in love again and it made me wish I was born in the same magical world as Tristan was. Go catch it!
Yannisms 