London Film Festival 2012: Ginger & Rosa Review

rating: 1.5

Sally Potter's (Orlando, Yes) latest drama had boundless potential to make teen icons out of leads Elle Fanning and newcomer Alice Englert. Respectively playing precocious British teens Ginger and Rosa, they are very much two sides of the same coin; Ginger is a serious, concerned activist, terrified by the threat of the Cold War and keen to do something about it, while Rosa is more along for the ride, hedonistic and keen to revolt in a more personal way. However, the smattering together of these two ideologies inevitably creates a schism in their friendship, one which Potter just can't wring any interesting drama out of, because her screenplay is so head-smackingly in spite of itself and everything else. Elle Fanning is a fantastic actress, and though her Brit accent here doesn't seem light-years ahead of her sister Dakota's from the recent dud Now Is Good - one certainly suspects they had the same vocal coach - Elle's register definitely sounds less affected. Christina Hendricks (playing Ginger's mother), also an American, is slightly more convincing, even if one can't help but wonder why they didn't just cast top-shelf British actresses in the first place. Potter underscores the film with ripe sexual tension firing off in all directions, and at least initially, refuses to move in conventional circles with it, avoiding the coming-of-age sexual awakening cliché, if disappointingly succumbing to it in the film's second half. Other than the unrealised side of the fizzling tension, her film is resolutely dull, making caricatures out of the politically vociferous characters, propelled by a preachy screenplay which only on one sure occasion shows a remote sense of self-awareness. So invested is this story in middle-class loftiness that to excise it - as is best advisable - wouldn't leave much of a film; trying to discern whether several characterisations are intentionally funny or not - namely the suggestion that Ginger's bohemian father (Alessandro Nivola) cries when he listens to Schubert - proves a repetitive, troublesome act. Given that, broadly speaking, Potter's screenplay does little to vindicate its virulent middle-class stereotypes through humour, one is left to deduce that the film is, in fact, entirely earnest in its depiction. There is, however, little denying that Potter's film has been beautifully composed, yet Robbie Ryan's fine lensing work only makes the hollow screenplay all that more apparent. Insufferable posturing begets thoroughly unlikeable characters, particularly putting a dent in Fanning's otherwise laudable performance. Though dreariness can often by qualified as "existential angst", here it is crowbarred in by way of trite, poorly argued political sentiments, insufficient in either educating the viewer or even making us sympathise with the characters on the most base level. By the time the third-act eventualities ensue, the film has very much derailed itself amid risible melodrama, and near-constant bleating about how the world might end today. Fanning's final opportunity to chew scenery - as she loudly declares that we're all going to die - will likely be met with as many sniggers as sobs, a criticism more of Potter's writing and direction than anything. Had it been adequately telegraphed, Fanning's tantrum might have actually been affecting (in the right way). It's a staggering out-of-touch film, a hammy affair which seems only vaguely aware of how grating its characters are. At the end of the day, the only thing this film likes more than the sound of its own voice is the sound of the talented actors speaking it. An unintentional self-parody of middle-class angst that holds its pompously overwrought drama so dear, it's difficult to imagine anyone other than first-year university students enjoying it. Adding insult to injury, fine actors like Annette Bening, Timothy Spall and Oliver Platt are mostly wasted in stock supporting roles. Ginger & Rosa is in UK cinemas October 19th.