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How entertaining? ★★★☆☆
Thought provoking? ★☆☆☆☆ 5 December 2012
This article is a review of LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED. |
“I’m a guy who’s chosen to be by himself,” Philip
LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED is a very odd choice for director Susanne Bier. Renowned internationally for crafting quality melodrama, from OPEN HEARTS and THINGS WE LOST IN THE FIRE to BROTHERS and AFTER THE WEDDING. Fresh from winning the foreign language film Oscar for IN A BETTER WORLD, you would think she now has the opportunity to be daring, or to tackle an obscure passion project. A rom-com starring Pierce Brosnan echoing his MAMMA MIA! was I guess just as leftfield. A wasted opportunity however? Something so populist is definitely under the radar for Bier-watchers. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not criticising a desire to reach a wide audience. It’s just that if you’re going to go for this genre, one hopes for something refreshing, e.g. ETERNAL SNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND, or expertly handled, e.g. SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK.
LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED is a very odd choice for director Susanne Bier. Renowned internationally for crafting quality melodrama, from OPEN HEARTS and THINGS WE LOST IN THE FIRE to BROTHERS and AFTER THE WEDDING. Fresh from winning the foreign language film Oscar for IN A BETTER WORLD, you would think she now has the opportunity to be daring, or to tackle an obscure passion project. A rom-com starring Pierce Brosnan echoing his MAMMA MIA! was I guess just as leftfield. A wasted opportunity however? Something so populist is definitely under the radar for Bier-watchers. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not criticising a desire to reach a wide audience. It’s just that if you’re going to go for this genre, one hopes for something refreshing, e.g. ETERNAL SNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND, or expertly handled, e.g. SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK.
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We have the Dominic Cooper-Amanda Seyfried beautiful couple in the form of Molly Blixt Egelind’s Astrid and Sebastian Jessen’s Patrick. They’re in their early 20s, and due to be married after dating for three months. Really? Why would they do that? If LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED were a period piece fair enough, but we’re not in Jane Austen territory. Patrick’s mother, and the focus of proceedings, is Ida (Trine Dyrholm). Our first encounter is at a hospital. The incongruously, amusingly abrupt doctor tells her that in three months she will get the results for whether the all clear, from her breast cancer, will be given. This comedy abrasiveness between characters is the dominant tone, and saves the movie from anonymity.
Not only has Ida been suffering such a serious illness, she walks in on her husband banging his company’s accountant, and the paramour is not much older than his daughter. Ida kicks him out, but is frustratingly a bit of a doormat. At the same time we meet Brosnan’s Philip: a misanthropic fruit and veg mogul widower. Groan. Can you predict where LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED is heading? The setting for the wedding and romance fireworks is a beautiful Italian coastal retreat.
Rom-com haters are unlikely to be converted, though if you find yourself dragged to a screening, you won’t be stultified. There are some surprises, and the humour has an enjoyably sour tang to counteract the cheesiness. Also, LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED perhaps feels like an ironic title. When the credits roll, there is a lack of catharsis, and I wonder if anyone has really learnt anything.
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