The Beguiled (Sofia Coppola, 2017)

[Jeff]

Sofia Coppola will reportedly begin shooting a remake of The Beguiled later this year. It's one of my favorite Don Siegel films, but I think Coppola is a perfect fit for the material, and it sounds like this will be a new take on adapting the novel. Nicole Kidman, Kirsten Dunst, and Elle Fanning are already on board. The Eastwood role has yet to be cast.

[flyonthewall2983]

The Beguiled

[domino harvey]

I wonder who made this movie

[swo17]

The Coppola font gives it away.

[domino harvey]

Please restrict your responses to addressing Sofia Coppola by her full name at least three times per post

[swo17]

Sorry. Also though, isn't this a remake of a Michael Cimino film?

[flyonthewall2983]

At least it isn't Imani. "I poop in a clam" would probably be repeating itself in my head the whole time. Damn you Pop Up Video.

[MoonlitKnight]

There's been talk of remaking this for years; it's finally happening, obviously. While Sofia can get a bit 'girly' at times in her work, hopefully this will be closer to "The Virgin Suicides" than "The Bling Ring."

[Big Ben]

Looks too good to be true! Will have to see how this stacks up against the Siegel version!

[Satori]

There's been talk of remaking this for years; it's finally happening, obviously. While Sofia can get a bit 'girly' at times in her work, hopefully this will be closer to "The Virgin Suicides" than "The Bling Ring."

Sorry, I just have to ask: what is it about The Virgin Suicides that makes it more "manly" than The Bling Ring?

But I hope Colin Farrell will give The Beguiled a sufficient amount of testosterone for you

[zedz]

There's been talk of remaking this for years; it's finally happening, obviously. While Sofia can get a bit 'girly' at times in her work, hopefully this will be closer to "The Virgin Suicides" than "The Bling Ring."

Sorry, I just have to ask: what is it about The Virgin Suicides that makes it more "manly" than The Bling Ring?

Kirsten Dunst arm-wrestled Emma Watson and damn near broke her arm.

[Brian C]

All I know is that watching BLING RING gave me cooties.

[Harry Caul]

Terrible idea to re-make the classic Clint Eastwood film The Beguiled; the original from the early '70's had a great "Southern Gothic" feel, and may even be my favorite CE film. There is no way a re-make will do the original justice.

I'm a huge Sofia Coppola fan (I even like her lesser films), but I'll probably give this a pass.

[zedz]

Terrible idea to re-make the classic Clint Eastwood film The Beguiled; the original from the early '70's had a great "Southern Gothic" feel, and may even be my favorite CE film. There is no way a re-make will do the original justice.

I'm a huge Sofia Coppola fan (I even like her lesser films), but I'll probably give this a pass.

Are you sure you're not a lukewarm, fairweather Sofia Coppola fan?

[lacritfan]

Trailer

[djproject]

There's a conundrum for Mike Stoklasa (of RedLetterMedia fame/infamy) for he has a star crush on Kirsten Dunst but hates Sofia Coppola. (I can also concede the former claim as troll sarcasm.)

[The Narrator Returns]

Full trailer

[jazzo]

Am I wrong, or is this actually the second remake of Eastwood/Siegel's film? Isn't Trueba's 1992 film, Belle Epoque, just a more farcical take?

[The Narrator Returns]

This is shaping up to be the best-reviewed film at Cannes this year, with nothing but raves coming out about it thus far.

[domino harvey]

Not really, the trades don't like it much

[All the Best People]

This film didn't really work for me. It is indeed beautiful (One Perfect Shot: The Movie). The acting is universally strong, which is good, as there is absolutely no depth to the characterizations, so the actors have to provide pretty much everything. The thematics, such as they are, are remarkably shallow; just revealing the premise gives you at least as much as the full film does, and a post-film discussion of what could have been is going to have more insights than anything on screen. It's actually a bit of a fun game to imagine other, even completely disparate filmmakers, taking this material in interesting directions: Bergman with the psychosexual viciousness of Persona or Whispers and Cries (yes, that's the proper title); De Palma, luxuriating in beautiful, hypnotic "trash"; Tarantino, building suspense and reintroducing the race element; Rivette, dramatizing the conflicts caused by the intrusion of the male presence into the female space, along with the theatrical elements of characters performing for each other (this of course harkens back to Gang of Four); Lynch, being Lynch. I have yet to see the Siegel version, but I would imagine it delivers far more of the luridness that this film needed -- I think the central problem is a total mismatch between Sofia Coppola's strengths and the needs of this subject matter.

(For reference, I adore Lost in Translation and remember liking The Virgin Suicides immensely, and liked Somewhere quite a bit; I thought Marie Antoinette was uneven but interesting, and I found The Bling Ring repetitive and inessential; I prefer The Beguiled to that, at least.)

[knives]

Well you have at least one other version to play with.

[mfunk9786]

The worst thing this film could've been was banal, but unfortunately that's what it ultimately proves to be.

SpoilerShow

I was giving it a healthy dose of benefit of the doubt because of the amusing set-ups and performances, but late in the second act when Farrell and Fanning are caught together, all of the air went out of the balloon in this respect - are we suddenly supposed to see this mild mannered and mostly respectful soldier as a monster merely because he was responsive to a consensual pursuit by a 17 or 18 year old girl, particularly considering the time period the film was set in? Sleazy, sure, but as a result of the sort of shrug of a misdeed, the third act didn't have the momentum and satisfaction it should have. It's almost as if Coppola was deliberately attempting to avoid anything too sensational - substitute Fanning with one of the very young girls and the finale would play a lot differently, for example. Instead we've got a pathetic man who is acting out of rage and frustration with the fate of his almost healed leg, perhaps understandably, without as much menace as would be required to see his murder as anything but a grim necessity - certainly nothing the audience I saw it with was jumping out of their seats over. Just sort of a sad coda to an unfortunate situation, which isn't exactly the combustible cinema this easily could have been.

I'm not asking that this be a Tarantino film, but it has so much lurid potential for pulp that is squandered in the service of telling this story very modestly at every turn. I wonder what could have been if Coppola were interested in turning up the volume a bit, but for now it's just an unremarkable collection of sumptuous visuals (make no mistake about one thing: this film looks great) that would have felt stuffy decades ago, let alone today.

[domino harvey]

David Ehrlich got sent a personalized promotional item

[DarkImbecile]

First and most importantly, the praise for Philippe Le Sourd's cinematography has, if anything, been understated. If there's no Oscar nomination coming for him, either the next six months will feature the most substantial wave of amazingly photographed films of my lifetime or the Academy Awards aren't the perfect arbiter of merit in the craft of filmmaking.

Secondly, my response to this was far more positive than the others in this thread, though I definitely sympathize with the view that the material could have been pushed farther and explored more thoroughly and entertainingly. At the same time, if I'm engaging with the movie I have instead of pining for what could have been, I can definitely appreciate what Coppola does with the story for what it is, the fine work of the cast, and the high level of production value on display.

I have to disagree with mfunk when it comes to the film

SpoilerShow

seeing Farrell's character as monstrous. I was actually impressed with how little judgement is passed by Coppola on the film's four adult/near adult leads, all of whom make bad decisions - with serious consequences - that are rooted in totally understandable and fundamentally human impulses and stem from an impossible situation they are forced into by circumstances totally outside their control. Kidman endangers her young charges by allowing Farrell to remain in the school in the first place, Dunst doubles down on Farrell's character even after his ugliest moments, Fanning is a self-involved teenager, and Farrell definitely chooses the wrong room to visit at night, but I don't think the film portrays any of these failings less sympathetically than the others, to its credit.

Not the kind of film that bowls you over with revelatory insights into the human experience or ingenious formal advances, but very much worth seeking out in a decent theater, and also worth choosing a frame or two to hang on your wall.