FILM-FORWARD.COMReviews of Recent Independent, Foreign, & Documentary Films in Theaters and DVD/Home Video
SYLVIA
Leaving too many gaps unfilled and questions raised but unanswered,
Sylvia is a thumbnail sketch of American poet Sylvia Path, becoming yet
another tale of a beautiful woman knocked off her pedestal. It follows
her years as a Fulbright scholar in Cambridge to her turbulent marriage
to British poet Ted Hughes (Daniel Craig). While his star is rapidly
rising, she subjugates her own writing to care for him and their young
children. In their marriage, the unfaithful Hughes is clearly the heavy.
In trying to convey the power of poetry, let alone Plath’s work, the film fails. A
jam
session where Cambridge students rapidly recite Shakespeare does
nothing more than to reveal the smugness of Plath and her circle. And,
while punting with Hughes, Plath reciting Chaucer to cows is a bit silly. Only
snipets of her own poems are heard.
Often the dialogue come across as pretentious and leaden, such as when
Plath accuses Hughes of infidelity - "The truth comes to me, the truth
loves me." Or, when responding to a compliment of her poetry, she
replies, "It feels like God speaking through me." The static direction slows the film’s pace, while the script gallops
through her life without developing
dramatic tension. At a
confrontational Christmas, after Hughes has left his family for another
woman, he offers to talk. Plath responds, "Are you still f------- her?" and
the scenes abruptly ends. The score, telegraphing Path's impending
doom, is overused, perhaps to provide emotion that the film would
otherwise lack. And the production design is so drab, that it's no wonder
that she, or anyone, would kill herself. However, in her portrayal,
Paltrow provides the depth that the script lacks, making a lot from very
little. Her Plath is more angrily determined than simply depressed.
Unfortunately, the portrayal of Hughes as a mumbling monotoned,
guarded, and brooding poet is opaque. Craig is completely
overshadowed by Paltow's charisma. But in Plath’s interactions with her
judgmental mother, played by Paltrow’s real-life mother Blythe Danner,
sparks fly. KT
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