Boogie Woogie

Dealer Art Spindle (Danny Huston) is trying to talk the Rhinegolds (Christopher Lee, Joanna Lumley) into selling an art piece. Beth Freemantle (Heather Graham) is his assistant. Robert Freign (Simon McBurney) is the couple's butler. Couple Bob (Stellan Skarsgård) and Jean Maclestone (Gillian Anderson) are Art's competitors. Bob is sleeping with Beth. Jean wants artist Jo Richards (Jack Huston) who wants Art's new assistant Paige Oppenheimer (Amanda Seyfried). Elaine (Jaime Winstone) and Joany (Meredith Ostrom) are a lesbian couple and Dewey Dalamanatousis (Alan Cumming) is their manager.

The world of London high art is probably great for satire. It's a lot of characters doing selfish things for themselves. None of them are that compelling. It's hard to root for anybody. I don't care about any of them. Also it's not funny. That would have really helped. Danny Huston is probably the most compelling character for me.

I'll admit that it didn't take much persuasion for me to go and see Boogie Woogie, but even though I admit part of me went to see boobs, I also went for the all-star cast and interesting and unique concept. It's a film with a Hollywood cast set in present day London with a focus on the art scene of the city; exploring people like artists and collectors. It's a refreshingly unique and modern set-up for a film and it works.

The story itself focuses on a painting called the Boogie Woogie by an artist named Mondrian. It's currently in the ownership of Alfred Rhinegold (Christopher Lee) and his wife Alfreda (Joanna Lumley). Their fortune is declining and so Alfreda decides to put the painting up for sale. Among those interested are aggressive gallery owner and ambi-sexual Art Spindle (Danny Huston) and the deep-pocketed collector Bob Maclestone (Stellan Skarsgard). Bob is married to Jean (Gillian Anderson) who he frequently cheats on with his secretaries and assistants. Beth Freemantle (Heather Graham) works for Spindle but manages to get away thanks to her intimate relationship with Bob.

Then there's gallery girl Paige (Amanda Seyfried), whose financier dad bagged a fortune and helped launch his daughter before being caught and imprisoned for unspecified fraud. Also inhabiting the decadent art world of the film is emerging young painter Jo (Jack Huston), who snorts coke and beds the horny older wives of extravagant collectors. The final character of note is Elaine (Jamie Winstone). Elaine is a lesbian art student with a fondness for cocaine and Heather Graham's boobs.

As you can tell, it's a massive cast of extremely colourful characters full of drugs and sex. All the actors do a terrific job thanks to their sharp acting and also the witty dialogue provided by the interesting script.

The problem with having such a huge cast is that it's a bit hard to keep track of things. The main plot strand seems to be Lumley's character trying to sell the painting, but then all the other characters seem to have their own stories as well which need to be fitted in. As great as the characters are, there simply isn't enough time to develop them enough to make some of them worthwhile. Some of the sex also seems a bit forced, the lesbian subplot with heather Graham and Jamie Winstone is hot and all but is it really needed (my heart says yes, my brain says no)? The director Duncan Ward is clearly at home though as some research led me to discover that he has history in the art world. He manages to make it very compelling and keeps the slightly bewildering but also interesting plot enjoyable. He is most definitely in his element and it shows; the film looks great.

Boogie Woogie is a very entertaining film. The concept is unique, the cast is excellent, the script and dialogue are very amusing and it looks great. The director also puts in a fine shift. Unfortunately, there's just too much going on; it's a brave and daring effort to release a film so different and props to the cast for signing up to it. If you can keep your head around all the plot strands then the great performances and script will keep you entertained.

3/5

Boogie Woogie is a refreshing look at a subject which has hereto been dealt with in a clichéd and stilted way. Being involved in the art world myself this is the most accurate rendering of it I have ever seen.

Danny Huston is brilliant at the slippery but charming art dealer Art Spindle who delicately spins his collectors into buying and selling works or art.

Christopher Lee is the cantankerous old man who refuses to sell his Boogie Woogie Mondrian while his wife Joana Lumley tries desperately to make him see sense.

Gillian Anderson is particularly fabulous as the spoilt collectors wife who is having an affair with Jack Huston. Jamie Winston is an ambitious lesbian artist who is determined to make it at any cost including seducing Heather Graham to have a show in her gallery.

Amanda Seyfried climbs the greasy pole of the art world in spectacular fashion. There is a particularly funny scene between Gillian Anderson and Charlotte Rampling inter cut with Stellan Skarsgard and his lawyer carving up the assets for their divorce.

The film reminded me of Altman with many stories interwoven around a central theme. The script is both horrific and funny. How art is manufactured, exhibited, dealt with and abused as well as worshiped could not be more on the money.

It is worth mentioning the art in the film which has been chosen by Damien Hirst. There are paintings by among others John Currin, Paul Fryer and Michael Craig Martin. This is a must for any art student wanting to know about how the art world works.

In what has to be one of the more stranger/esoteric cast-ensembles, this film never really finds itself. Is it a dark dromedy', a spoof on the art world, is the film deliberately pretentious and self aware to mirror the self-importance of the modern art world, or just poking fun at the clueless rich? I can't figure it out, thats the directors fault. Gillian Anderson, one of Hollyweird's hottest lesbians, who only seems to only get prettier as she ages, as the lead, sucks the life out of every scene, poor lassie can't act. She needs to stick to pensive brooding and muted soft-spoken pouting, with the posed slow-motion blinking. Otherwise the cast is very talented, all with discrete character development: none of them very redeeming or likable. Most unusual, is the setting which takes place in London, yet feels like its in lower Manhattan, half of the cast is American; I thought Madonna was the only wealthy American to transplant despite the indigenous draconian tax-rate. Most everyone is a self-assumed art critic or "genius" and nearly all of them are perverted in one way or another. Again, see it for the babes, especially the Amanda Seyfried up-skirt scenes.

If you enjoy watching bad people go down in flames, this film is for you. First-time director Duncan Ward shows a deft hand managing multiple story threads set against the malodorous intestinal cavity of the contemporary art world, while John Mathieson's photography, pleasing to the eye as always, works splendidly with the up-tempo jazz phrasings of composer Janusz Podrazik.

A sterling ensemble, led by Stellan Skarsgard, Gillian Anderson and Danny Huston, keeps us guessing and amused as lives and careers unravel. Special kudos to Jaime Winstone, who in the role of a fiercely ambitious performance artist looking to carve a name for herself, delivers the film's strongest performance. We are treated also to appearances by Christopher Lee, Joanna Lumley and Alan Cumming -- the film's most likable characters -- whose upright aims provide elegant counterpoint to the opposing riffraff inhabiting the story.

The film's only noticeable weak spot lies in the characters of Beth, played with limited effect by Heather Graham, and Joany, played by Meredith Ostrum, who seems to be impersonating a tree. Otherwise, a fine independent film. It will be interesting to see what Ward comes up with next.