artfarris

Whose brilliant idea was it to make a movie about drag but make it about a straight guy doing drag for the first time (and effortlessly beating his face) while the actual drag queens are reduced to ham-fisted stereotypes? I could see glimmers of talent and the plot line is well constructed. But the final product is the pits.

A somewhat engaging film that recounts the Berlin years of Christopher Isherwood's diary. I'm not a Doctor Who fan, so I was more distracted by the fact that Matt Smith looks nothing like Christopher Isherwood, nor does Imogen Poots look anything like Jean Ross, but they both give adequate performances. The film mainly plays upon two brief love affairs and the trials and tribulations of Isherwood's boarding house neighbors, with Toby Jones giving a great performance as an immoral conman with a penchant for S&M-- frankly his character was the most interesting in the film. In the end, like most biographies, it only touches upon great matters like Hitler's rise to power, the plight of the gay men of Berlin and the coming world war. Ultimately, it was a fragmented film without a plot.