Wednesday
20Aug2008
Red Band Trailer - Ben Kingsley and Penelope Cruz Heat Up 'Elegy'
Wednesday, August 20, 2008 at 2:29PM 
In general, I don't think
Philip Roth novels transfer very well to the
screen. Certainly, anyone who sat through Portnoy's Complaint had
complaints of his or her own, and most recently, The Human Stain was spun
from a Roth book, and that didn't end very well, either.
And while it's a risky proposition to put too much
weight into a trailer,
Elegy looks like an entirely different
situation. It's based on the novel The Dying Animal, and even though
Ben Kingsley has kind of been all over the road
in the past few years (he's popped up in everything from Sexy Beast and The Wackness to Suspect Zero and The Love Guru), it appears that he's giving the kind of thoughtful,
intelligent, weathered performances he can be so good at.
Penelope Cruz also looks up to snuff here, and
she's usually not very good when she has to speak English. That's not really a
criticism, though, because in the Almodovar movies, she's perfectly fine. I first became aware of what this movie was when I saw the posters above earlier this summer. But, knowing it was Philip Roth, I was skeptical. Today, with the unveiling of this new Red Band trailer, I'm a little relieved and excited: This looks pretty damn good. As always, Red Band trailers are the not safe for work variety, and since they're unrated, they are intended for mature audiences.
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