Tuesday, November 20, 2007

As promised...

My review of Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium is now online at RevolutionSF.
Midway through Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium, Molly Mahoney, played by Natalie Portman, explains to the eponymous Magorium that as a child, people marveled at her potential as a classical pianist -- but now that she's an adult, people are still waiting for her to fulfill that potential. That, in a nutshell, sums up Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium -- a movie with its heart in the right place, but one that never quite lives up to its promise.

I mention in the review that I believe many of the film's flaws can be traced to the fact that Zach Helm is a first-time director. Here's an example that really stood out for me, but just wouldn't fit into the review:

Early in the film, one of the opening scenes, in fact, shows Natalie Portman's character playing the piano, attempting to complete her first concerto. Portman can play the piano. She learned several years ago for a role. So far, so good. Except... Helm frames the scenes as if he's covering up the fact that Portman can't play. He moves the camera in on her face, with the bulk of the piano hiding her hands. Then he does a close-up of her hands, so that you can't see who they're attached to. Then he frames the scene from the side, with the piano, again, hiding her hands. It looks for all the world like the standard filmmaker's trick of disguising an actor's musical inability... and it's very obvious. Which is mind boggling, since a signature tic of the character is to "air piano" songs with her fingers throughout the film. It's not until the end of the film, when she's paying "Jennifer Juniper" in a piano lounge, that there's a long establishing shot that clearly shows her actually playing. And then it's right back to the "hide the hands" mentality. I've never claimed to be any kind of compositional genius, but several better shot structures suggest themselves even to me. All I can think of is that Helm framed them this way because that's the way he most often sees piano scenes set up in movies and television. Which is, to my mind, a error of inexperience.

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