The Baroness and the Pig

Call me a cultural bigot, but I'm predisposed to dislike Canadian movies. Don't ask me why, because I love the rest of what the country offers. I'm just skeptical that even the best movie produced in Canada can rival the middle of the Hollywood pack. The Baroness and the Pig supports my case.

I believe that Michael Mackenzie is a playwright by trade, and in fact this film might have been better suited to the theatre. Nevertheless, in his directing debut, Mackenzie delivers an incredibly beautiful film, making exquisite choices of sepia-toned elegance that nicely complements this period piece set in France. Patricia Clarkson is excellent as the Baroness, but the rest of the cast is generally disappointing, especially Caroline Dhavernas as Emily, a plum role that she somehow manages to perform without eliciting the slightest emotional response from the audience. This is perhaps the biggest disappointment of the entire film, although the script is uneven and the pace a little sluggish at times.

Mackenzie shows promise as a director, and this may be one of the best films out of Canada this year. What does that tell you?

Of the 10 films I saw at Sundance, this one was my least favorite. The film was supposed to be set in the late 1800s, but something just didn't ring true. The script was adapted from a play, and it didn't translate well to the screen. Patricia Clarkson did a fine job portraying the baroness, an American who supposedly married for love and moved to France, where she took on an "enfant savage", aka wild child who had been raised by pigs as a special project. Her husband in the movie was such a sadistic, sick, mean, woman hating jerk, that it was extremely difficult to see how she had fallen in love with him. I suppose it was realistic that the "pig" character had awful ugly sores all over her face, and particularly around her mouth, but they were so distracting that I found it hard to look at her. I cannot recommend this film

I was intrigued by the storyline, but was disappointed overall in the film. I think the director spent too much time on the visual aspects of the film, which I felt were distracting to driving the story to its ultimate resolution. Patty Clarkson was wonderful, as usual.