 Perhaps no film this year has been easier to make fun of in advance of its release than ‘Hyde Park on Hudson’. I know I had a few silly names for it earlier in 2012 when comparing it to something like ‘My Week with Marilyn’, but go figure…I prefer this film to that one. When I sat down to watch it during the New York Film Festival I already was aware that it had fallen from the status of being an Oscar contender, but somehow I emerged rather amused by the flick. It’s hardly great art, and is iffy as a biopic of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but it’s got some strong acting and works as a comedy of manners. Bill Murray is rather good as FDR, though the film focuses far less on him than you’d expect. More time is given to Laura Linney’s character, who’s our entry point into the story. Linney and Murray are very solid, but neither is quite nomination worthy for me. This is an easy movie to pick on, but I was charmed by what director Roger Michell and scribe Richard Nelson came up with and find myself recommending it now that it’s opening this weekend. Don’t expect it to be on the level of the awards hopefuls surrounding it, but taken on its own, ‘Hyde Park on Hudson’ is an entertaining little film.
Read more on Hyde Park on Hudson (***)…
Categories: Film Reviews Tags: Bill Murray, Biopic, Elizabeth Marvel, Elizabeth Wilson, Hyde Park on Hudson, Laura Linney, olivia colman, Olivia Williams, Oscar hopeful, Richard Nelson, Roger Michell, Samuel West
 A few months back, Hyde Park on Hudson looked like a premium slice of King’s Speech-style Oscar bait. Then the trailer hit, and its awards chances looked somewhat slimmer. This morning I attended a screening of the film, and if the Academy decides to reward this lacklustre exercise in dreary historical drama then I may have to take a year away from the race altogether.
Read more on BFI London Film Festival – DAY 4…
Categories: Film Reviews Tags: BFI, BFI London Film Festival, Bill Murray, film review, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Hyde Park on Hudson, Laura Linney, LFF, London Film Festival, olivia colman, Olivia Williams, Roger Michell, Samuel West
 Today the New York Film Festival brought a presumed Oscar hopeful, Germany’s official submission for the foreign language category at the Academy Awards, and a tender-hearted documentary that surprised the likes of many, including myself.
Hyde Park on Hudson (***)
I try extremely hard to not read reviews, especially for Oscar hopefuls. At Telluride and Toronto, Roger Michell’s Hyde Park on Hudson received mixed-to-negative reviews citing the film’s weak screenplay and other off-putting manners. Chalk this up to a guilty pleasure but I found Hyde Park on Hudson charmingly delightful. From the charismatic turn by Bill Murray as FDR to what I found to be a near pitch-perfect performance by Samuel West, the stylistic quality by director Roger Michell was satisfying. Read more on NYFF: Surprise “Hyde” Stand Out, Germany’s “Barbara,” and the Love of “Liv & Ingmar”…
Categories: Article, Editor, Film Reviews Tags: Barbara, Bill Murray, Christian Petzold, Cinema of Sweden, Documenatary, Editor Film Review, Eleanor Roosevelt, Entertainment/Culture, Film, Hyde Park on Hudson, Ingmar Bergman, Jeremy Sams, Laura Linney, Liv & Ingmar, Liv Ullman, Margaret Suckley, Nina Hoss, NYFF, NYFF 2012, olivia colman, Olivia Williams, Oscar, Persona, Production Designer, Richard Nelson, Roger Michell, Ronald Dehrfeld, Samuel West, Simon Bowles, Stefan Nilsson, Tushar Ghogale
Though beautifully mounted, impeccably shot and well put together by director Roger Michell, there seems to be a lack of passion within this film that is something required to help us understand what is happening with the characters.
Bill Murray as FDR, one of the greatest American Presidents, one of the great historical figures of the 20th century takes about five minutes to get settle in, and at that point we accept the actor as the great man. Murray has the speech patterns down, the physicality, but most important, he captures Roosevelt’s intellect and ferocious appetite for the female of our species. His affairs were legendary, though well concealed by his staff, at least one of them whom he was sleeping with. Common knowledge to everyone it seemed. What is it with great men and their marriages? Why can they not be loyal to the women they marry, who appear (it seems) to stand by them and support them. Look at Kennedy, or Clinton, much loved leaders who had trouble being faithful. Roosevelt, apparently was no different, and as played by Murray this manages to humanize him, knock him off the pedestal many have placed him on and allow the actor to portray him as a mere mortal. Read more on TIFF: Hyde Park on Hudson (**)…
Categories: Article, Film Reviews Tags: Bill Murray, Eleanor Roosevelt, Entertainment/Culture, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Hyde Park on Hudson, Laura Linney, Olivia Williams, Oscar hopeful, Roger Michell, Samuel West, TIFF, TIFF 2012, Toronto Film Festival
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Perhaps no film this year has been easier to make fun of in advance of its release than ‘Hyde Park on Hudson’. I know I had a few silly names for it earlier in 2012 when comparing it to something like ‘My Week with Marilyn’, but go figure…I prefer this film to that one. When I sat down to watch it during the New York Film Festival I already was aware that it had fallen from the status of being an Oscar contender, but somehow I emerged rather amused by the flick. It’s hardly great art, and is iffy as a biopic of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but it’s got some strong acting and works as a comedy of manners. Bill Murray is rather good as FDR, though the film focuses far less on him than you’d expect. More time is given to Laura Linney’s character, who’s our entry point into the story. Linney and Murray are very solid, but neither is quite nomination worthy for me. This is an easy movie to pick on, but I was charmed by what director Roger Michell and scribe Richard Nelson came up with and find myself recommending it now that it’s opening this weekend. Don’t expect it to be on the level of the awards hopefuls surrounding it, but taken on its own, ‘Hyde Park on Hudson’ is an entertaining little film.
