Being the Ricardos

I loved the series and I appreciate the fine work of Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem. The accuracy can be only a detail in this chronicle of the US TV shows history and, I admitt , I do not know very much about the life of the main characters. But I am satisfied by the ball of stories used by director Aaron Sorkin for creating a realistic portrait of a period. This is the basic virtue of this film - to give a large picture of a time , in its precise details and rich significances. The bad detail - the horrible make up of Nicole Kidman , giving impression of plastic face. Like many biopics , a hommage to an epoque. Intense effort, good acting, nice reconstruction of series scenes and a decent manner to reflect the story of a not just ordinary couple.

Meandering. Boring. How can a movie about Lucy not have one laugh? For two hours I couldn't stop looking at the horrible makeup on Nicole Kidman. This is your typical biopic. And when you have Sorkin at the helm, it is going to be bloated, overwritten and plodding. There has to be a better one down the road.

I really wanted to like this movie! I love Nicole & Javier and I of course am an I Love Lucy fan. But this just did not work for me. I couldn't see the characters, only the actors. It felt off with everything, like a puzzle that didn't fit. Maybe I'm not an Aaron Sorkin fan? I'm not sure but this one wasn't my favorite and I couldn't finish it unfortunately.

I have been a fan of the "I LOVE LUCY" show since I was a kid in the 70's, watching the re runs.

Over the years I have picked up the occasional tid bits of information about them, but never really went looking. I was eager to watch this movie, and admittedly did learn a lot.

What was missing for me, was the emotional attachment that I was very surprised I did not feel towards the movie characters considering the fond feelings and memories I have towards the original people.

I felt like Nicole Kidman just lacked something that Lucille Ball had.

I dont know if it was her acting as much as it was a screenplay that didn't quite reach the depth of, or really capture, the obviously intense time during that particular week of their lives. The movie did show a few flashbacks to give the audience a chance to connect and understand the characters more deeply but for me it did not do that. It only left me feeling more disengaged. Both of them, I am positive, had interesting and incredible lives, just by the lone fact of the time period they lived in. Everyone who lived during that time has a shared understanding that we , as later generations just dont get. The sreenplay fails to fully make the audience FEEL what that timeframe in our history felt like, and todays generations cant really emotionally connect without understanding THAT first. For me, That was the first step backwards. Without Kidman bringing to life, Lucy, I was emotionally absent.

As usual, I am in the minority again about my opinion of the actor Bardem. I actually think he did better than Kidman in bringing his character to life. In fact, it was both male actors (Bardem as Desi and Simmons playing Fred) that blew the 2 main female leads, (kidman as Lucy and Arianda as Ethel)out of the water.

It was an okay movie. A little stiff, a little unemotional. And it did make me really crave for someone to step up and write a great mini series about Desi and Lucy. Because I dont think you have a chance of capturing them in a 2 hour movie.

And of course, maybe hire an unknown yet exceptional actress to play Lucy. There are plenty to choose from.

As TV's "I Love Lucy" reaches 20 million households a week in the US in the early 1950s, it's star, Lucille Ball, is fighting Communist affiliation rumors started by columnist Walter Winchell; she's also fighting with husband and co-star Desi Arnaz about his lack of marital attention and is about to reveal to the television audience that both she and her TV-counterpart, Lucy Ricardo, are "expecting". Although this handsomely-produced portrait of the legendary actress is an entertaining one, there are a myriad of timeline issues and anachronisms within the film which "I Love Lucy" purists are bound to be troubled by. There's also a hurdle in buying Javier Bardem as Desi Arnaz (Bardem has Desi's Cuban-accented voice--and his flirtatious charms--down, but he's too old for the role). Kidman fares better as Lucy, proving her naysayers wrong and giving a wry, tough, courageous performance. Lucy's off-camera relationship with Vivian Vance (played by Nina Arianda) is curiously edgy despite reports throughout the years these two were the best of friends; meanwhile, codger William Frawley (J. K. Simmons) is shown to be irascible yet cogent and sharp in place of the heavy drinker Arnaz went out on a limb to have cast. I didn't care for the documentary-like framing device of the show's creators discussing the series in the present day (there's enough flashbacks and flash-forwards happening here); however, when writer-director Aaron Sorkin gets down to business, he delivers some terrifically tasty behind-the-scenes action. **1/2 from ****