Keira Knightley, Alexander Skarsgard can’t turn up the heat in The Aftermath: EW review

As pitches go, what could possibly be more of a slam dunk than a lush period drama with Keira Knightley falling for Alexander Skarsgard in post-World War II Germany? Sadly, director James Kent’s sappy and utterly unconvincing new film The Aftermath shows that even the most foolproof ideas wither in the face of turgid, overripe melodrama.

The film opens in 1945 Hamburg, where the Allies are busy putting a bombed-out and humiliated Germany back in running order. Jason Clarke, badly hamstrung by a role full of blank expressions, plays a British Army colonel named Lewis Morgan who’s in charge of… well, it’s hard to say what exactly. But he’s important enough to requisition the gorgeous estate of a widowed German architect named Stefan Lubert (Skarsgard). Because he’s either sympathetic or a bit of a fool, Lewis allows Stefan and his teenage daughter (Flora Thiemann) to keep living there, albeit in the attic.

Lewis’ resentful wife, Rachael (Knightley), soon arrives to join her husband and is immediately put off by the domestic arrangement. It turns out their child recently died in a German bombing raid, and she’s clearly uncomfortable living under the same roof as the enemy. Until, very quickly, she isn’t….

You don’t need me to tell you that Knightley can be a terrific actress, especially in period dramas like this, which have become her bread and butter. But her character goes from disgust to diving headlong into forbidden passion with astoundingly convenient quickness. You don’t buy it for a second. Her chemistry with the equally easy-on-the-eyes Skarsgard just isn’t there. This is the sort of snogging-away-their-grief nonsense that seems like it would work a lot better in a novel — and probably did when Rhidian Brook wrote that novel in 2013.

There’s a totally superfluous subplot involving Stefan’s daughter falling for a Hitler Youth type, but that never goes anywhere interesting either. Nor does it gel with the A-story we’ve paid our money for: watching Knightley and Skarsgard smolder and clinch as the whole mad world falls apart around them. The Aftermath looks classy and sumptuous and comes with all the swooning, bodice-ripping bells and whistles the trailer promises. But it’s a cold, distant film. It freezes over when it should spark and catch fire. C+

More movie reviews:

The Aftermath (2019 movie)

Read More



from Trendy News Update https://ift.tt/2T2T6tq

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

10 things you need to know before the opening bell

Image
Here is what you need to know. Things are looking up for China’s manufacturing sector . “China’s manufacturing sector finished the opening quarter of 2019 on a positive note, with operating conditions improving for the first time since last November,” IHS Markit said in a report released Monday. “Firms signalled slightly quicker rises in output and overall new work, while employment increased for the first time in over five years.” China is using debt to control the South China Sea .  China’s One Belt One Road project and the massive infrastructure loans associated with it are helping to weaken opposition to its claims in the South China Sea. Japan announces the name of the era under the new emperor .  Naruhito will become the Japanese emperor on May 1, beginning the “Reiwa” era. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a fan of MMT — here’s what it is . Modern Monetary Theory says governments who create their own money can spend freely because they can always print more money to pay off t
Read more

Zelensky to face Poroshenko in Ukraine run-off: exit poll

Image
Kiev, Ukraine – Comedian  Volodymyr Zelensky will face incumbent President Petro Poroshenko in a runoff vote for  Ukraine ‘s presidency, exit polls have shown. Zelensky,  a political novice  who is better known for playing a president in a TV sitcom, was projected to win 30.6 percent of the votes cast on Sunday,  according to surveys conducted by the Kiev International Institute of Sociology and the Razumkov Centre. “This is just a first step towards a great victory,” he told supporters after the publication of the exit polls.  Poroshenko, who has been in power since 2014, was forecast to come second, with 17.8 percent of the vote. “I critically and soberly understand the signal that society gave today to the acting authorities,” he said, accepting the projected results. It was a different story for  opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko, who disputed the surveys that showed her coming in third, with 14.2 percent of the vote.   “I urge not to consider exit polls as the ultima
Read more

The Walking Dead finale recap: A flicker of hope predicts big things ahead

The storm is here. The Kingdom is barren as snow begins to fall on the once thriving settlement. The fair is over, but the promised trade didn’t bring what many hoped. Their pipes still burst, the rot still spread, and this home, this beacon for so many who sought shelter from the cold apocalyptic wasteland, became untenable. So now, the King and Queen, still carrying the grief of losing their son, must now carry their people to Hilltop as a harsh blizzard descends upon them and the Whisperers still lurk in their periphery. But, once the storm passes and their friends on the hill open up their gates, it all seems like a blip on the timeline. We’re left with both hope and a promise of much bigger things to come. In the final moments before the credits roll, that radio Eugene, Rosita, and Gabriel have been tinkering with since the time jump, their initial mission that first put everyone on the warpath with the Whisperers, finally fulfilled its purpose. When the blizzard came, the power
Read more