Cinderella

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Kenneth Branagh/Starring: Cate Blanchett, Lily James, Richard Madden, Helena Bonham Carter, Stellan Skarsgard, Derek Jacobi, Nonzo Anozie, Holliday Grainger, Ben Chaplin and Sophie McShera and Rob Brydon

With myriad iterations of the Cinderella in film and television, one might expect a live action interpretation to be superfluous and unnecessary. But Kenneth Branagh's Cinderella proves any fairy tale can re-told if inspiration and heart serve as guides. I'm happy (and surprised) to say this version succeeds amiably, which is no small accomplishment, given the universal fondness for the Disney version. How Branagh pulls off this creative coup is due in part to breathtaking visuals, fine casting and maybe best of all, outstanding costumes, which are beautifully designed spectacles of color and texture.

I must admit that I came to the film with low expectations. Re-tellings or re-interpretations tend to be drearily revisionist, CGI nightmares or misguided attempts to make said stories seem contemporary and hip. Some horrific examples from recent years are Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Sam Raimi's Oz the Great and Powerful. I realize both films are more retellings that anything else, but the two films share an awareness of their more successful predecessors, which doesn't help.

If one is to take on a beloved story like Cinderella, it helps to cast actors with presence and quirky charm. Who better to fill the shoes of the iconic wicked stepmother than Cate Blanchett, who plays the character as if she invented it. Of course we need a disarming couple to play the put-upon heroine and the charming prince. Lily James from Downton Abbey and Richard Madden from Game of Thrones make an attractive, fairy tale pair who don't rely solely on their youthful comeliness to give their characters warmth and spirit.

Branagh doesn't tweak the story or characters much, which is a sound approach. We see Ella (the Cinder appendage comes later) and her loving family residing in their idyllic country home. Ella enjoys harmonious relations with nature and as one would expect (demand?) her mice are always about to provide companionship. But tragedy befalls the family when Ella's mother passes away. Her father (Ben Chaplain) remarries and suddenly Ella's halcyon life is upended when her new stepmother (Blanchett) and her insufferable new stepsisters Drisella and Anastasia (played with diabolical glee by Sophie McShera and Holliday Grainger) become permanent fixtures in her home. Unfortunately for Ella, her father is often away on business, leaving her in the company of her step-family, who have little love for their new digs and even less for their new step family member. When an accident claims her father's life, Ella suddenly finds she is little more than a scullery maid for her new step-family.

Slaving around the clock, Ella manages to escape the cottage one day for a ride in the forest. There, she encounters a handsome prince (Madden) who is busy leading a stag hunt. Incensed by the idea of a woodland creature being stalked, Ella convinces the Prince to halt the hunt. Fairy-tale sparks fly and though Ella returns home knowing very little about the prince, she feels a resonant buzz from the encounter.

Back home among her wicked step-family, Ella's ash-soiled face becomes the butt of her stepsisters jokes, which earns her the sobriquet Cinder-Ella.

The rest of the film is more or less faithful to the classic story; the invitation to the ball, which serves as a means for the prince to choose a princess, Cinderella's confinement during the ball, the fairy godmother's fateful appearance, etc.

So what does Branagh's Cinderella do to earn its own relevance? Simple: it cares about the characters more than CGI. But what CGI we do see is deployed with discretion and taste.
Branagh, as a seasoned director of Shakespearean adaptations, understands stimulating characters and dialogue make for more compelling drama than the visual rubbish. Having directed big budget, CGI-dependent Hollywood fare like Thor and live action drama like Henry V, with its Kurosawa-like battle scenes, it's probably safe to say Branagh respects humans more than special effects wizardry.

Another quality in this production are the memorable costumes. The staggeringly beautiful designs make a powerful impression. Cate Blanchett was quite striking in her various dresses, which not only suggested elegance but sex appeal. This wicked stepmother had some delicious curves the dresses accentuated quite nicely. Blanchett's lovely blue eyes and camera-loving red hair must be a cinematographer's delight and a costumer designer's muse. Costumer designer Sandy Powell, whose impressive resume includes many Scorsese films and the costume dramas Shakespeare in Love and Hugo, intoxicates our eyes with vivid, tactile colors. Though I wasn't a fan of Hugo, I can still recall Powell's gorgeous costumes. In Cinderella one can admire the beautiful finery; the shiny embroidery, the stunning ball gowns that blossom like flowers, Cinderella's other-worldly blue dress and the offbeat humor of Anastasia's and Drisella's polka-dotted skirts. Though Lily James is quite lovely in her ball gown, I wanted to see more of Blanchett in the seductive green she always seems to be wearing.

Fairy tales are only as good as the villains who inhabit them and the film is well served by Blanchett, who is deliciously diabolical. Her slithery saunters are sexy; she's a witch in satiny fabrics and she's pleased to be so. She has a lot of fun with the role and she doesn't waste the opportunity. Helena Bonham-Carter as the fairy godmother is another bit of inspired casting. Her ever-eccentric presence is perfect for the character and she is quite amusing.

I enjoyed Cinderella. I'm hardly conferring masterpiece accolades on Branagh's film but it is true to its fairy-tale status. It has humor and aesthetic appeal and will beguile both the young and old.

The Railway Man

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Jonathan Teplitzky, Starring: Colin Firth, Nicole Kidman and Stellan Skarsgard

Early 80s' England, a middle-age man meets an attractive woman on a train. After some conversation, it's immediately apparent they have fallen for one another. In spite of this, the man exits the train at the first stop and realizing he may have made a grievous error, meets the woman down the line and in doing so, begins a deliriously happy courtship and marriage. Or so we think.

It isn't long after they've set up their domicile before Patti, the wife,(Nicole Kidman) finds her husband Eric (Colin Firth) writhing on the floor in agony and it isn't long before we learn the cause of such suffering. Patti discovers Eric was once a prisoner of war in the pacific theater in WWII, more specifically southeast asia. Eric's reticence about his experiences leads her to his friend and former fellow prisoner Finlay (Stellan Skarsgard), who divulges what he and Eric and others endured at the hands of the Japanese in a labor camp.

Eric and Finlay were part of an army engineering group whose skills the Japanese enlisted in the camp but the engineer's cooperation only goes so far as they use their considerable technical skills to craft a radio to receive allied news of the war's progress. Learning from a British broadcast that the Germans are losing ground in the European theater, morale surges. The engineers become determined to spread the news to the British troops and native laborers, who were unlucky enough not to be spared the punishing, torturous, back-breaking work on the railway the Japanese hope to build through the Burmese jungles and mountains. Eric's formidable knowledge of trains enables him to enlighten his fellow engineers that the railway system the Japanese are determined to build was once considered by British engineers but upon surveying the Burmese terrain and landscape, dismissed the idea as a work of brutality. He also informs them that such a project couldn't be accomplished by laborers alone; only an army could carry out the task. Eric's information, supported by his calculations, is met with anxious expressions by his colleagues. His ominous declaration is confirmed when he sees the British army regulars working under savage conditions on the railway. He even meets his former commanding officer on the labor crew as they dig through a hill of rock in the sweltering sun. The officer's face is one of exhaustion and madness as his blank stare reveals his mental and physical deterioration.

The radio is soon discovered, which brings the engineers before Japanese disciplinary officers. Seeing a fellow engineer endure a barbaric beating, Eric steps forward to accept culpability for the infraction. This leads to unspeakable torture and cruelty, but Finlay's account can only go so far, for even he doesn't know what Eric endured at the hands of the Japanese officers. He warns Patti that an attempt to force Eric to recollect might be fruitless and she could never hope to understand what he suffered. Undeterred, she presses on, hoping to understand what the Japanese visited upon Eric's mind and body. Ultimately we see what he suffered: severe beatings on his body with what resembles a hard axe-handle and often on broken bones in the process of healing. He also undergoes what is the Japanese version of waterboarding; a horrific and disturbing scene in the film. Though the Japanese officers are mostly single-mindedly sadistic in their methods, one officer shows compassion though he dare not express it to the soldiers intent on torturing Eric.

It is clear what happened 40 years earlier hasn't passed from the minds of those that shared Eric's imprisonment, for Finlay makes a statement by hanging himself above railway tracks (a poorly deployed, symbolically heavy-handed image). The act also serves as a warning to Eric about the perils of leaving the past unaddressed. Before Finlay's suicide, he gives Eric an article from a newspaper overseas about the officer who presided over Eric's torture; now a tour guide at the very labor camp where the British soldiers were held. As a way to face his grim past, Eric travels to the camp, now a tourist destination, to confront his former nemesis.

The film is based on Eric Lomax's real war and post-war experiences. The performances from the cast are powerful and affecting, particularly Firth's, who shows Eric's anguish and controlled rage when confronting his former interrogator. The actors cast in the roles of the principle character's younger selves are also exceptional. As the film swings from the war to present and back again, we see how deep, emotional scars he bears in middle-age are as raw as the physical torture was excruciating.

Most of The Railway Man works; the story is riveting and Eric Lomax's experiences make for a poignant film, though I don't think it wears the mantle of greatness. It is definitely worth the time and emotional commitment.