Telluride Film Festival 2017

[Chris Knipp]

Some Telluride reviews.


Annette Bening and Jamie Bell in Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool

FILM STARS DON'T DIE IN LIVERPOOL (My Week with Marilyn director Paul McGuigan - review for Variety by Peter Debruge. It's a biopic featuring Annette Bening, based on Peter Turner's memoir of Gloria Grahame, with Jamie Bell as Turner and jumping back and forth between 1979 and 1981 as it recounts a brief, steamy affair. Debruge says it's overproduced, but Peter Bradshaw of the Guardian finds " tremendous warmth and tenderness" in it and gives it 4 OUT OF 5 STARS. Not clear if Bradshaw is actually at Telluride since this is the only review by him published so far.

BATTLE OF THE SEXES (Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris)- Peter Debruge reviews this for Variety- "Emma Stone and Steve Carell face off in the epic boys-vs.-girls tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs." The directors are those who made Little Miss Sunshine. This period movie is about a famous tennis face-off between a man and a woman in which Billy Jean King won.

DARKEST HOUR (Joe Wright) review by Peter Debruge for Variety: "Hidden behind fake jowls and a receding hairline, Gary Oldman delivers one of the great performances of his career as Winston Churchill." This focuses on almost the opposite angle on events from Chris Nolan's Dunkirk, whose main character was appropriately named "Tommy" and which never showed Churchill or any general: it's all focused on Churchill. Oldman gives his all in wig and special prosthetic makeup that totally alters his appearance, except for the eyes, says Debruge. This is listed as debuting at Toronto, but obviously that's not true. And Debruge evidently is at Telluride.