I've been binging recently on the Desi Arnez / Lucille Ball story. I'm currently listening to an excellent TCM podcast on their lives and careers , Season 3 of "The Plot Thickens" if you want to look it up and have also just watched Amy Poehler's archival documentary "Lucy and Desi" so I guess it was inevitable that I would end up at Aaron Sorkin's movie which intertwines a key week for the couple at the height of their fame with a potted history of their time together and experiences in Hollywood.
It's 1952, they're at the height of their fame but Lucy and Desi are confronted with and have to face up to not one but three crucial events in their lives. Firstly, Lucy's fury at the widely-read "Confidential" magazine's front-page exposé of Desi's philandering lifestyle, then a potentially even more damaging revelation by coast-to-coast broadcaster Walter Winchell of Lucille's past sympathy with the Communist Party, this when the Red Scare in Hollywood was also peaking and finally the news that Lucy herself was pregnant again and the ramifications of this for their runaway success TV show "I Love Lucy".
My foreknowledge of events probably helped me to follow the action and I was thus able to recognise the sequence of events depicted even as I recognised in places the dramatic licence inevitably taken in some cases by Sorkin. Probably the most unusual plot-point he employs in the film is Lucy's insistence on effectively rewriting the next episode of the show, which while done to no doubt demonstrate Ball's intelligence and insight into how comedy works is also used to highlight her deflection of all the combined trauma of these potentially career-threatening incidents.
Try as I could, I just wasn't convinced by Nicole Kidman as Lucy. For me, she doesn't nail Ball's distinctive appearance or voice. Javier Bardem's Desi I felt was a better fit, his swarthy good looks and natural Latin-tinged accent worked better in his portrayal of Desi. J. K. Simmon's part as "I Love Lucy" co-star William Frawley on the other hand to be afforded over-prominence to me, do much so that it almost like a directorial sop to the actor himself. I also felt the recreated modern-day anecdotal interviews of the actual show's producer and writer to be distracting rather than helpful.
Sorkin's direction is stylish if prosaic at times as he carefully overlays his interlinked narratives. I also felt his dialogue sometimes came over as often unrealistic and stylised, with almost every line uttered by his characters straining for pith, wit and of course humour. I personally doubt that comedians and script-writers are always so erudite, a bit more mundanity would have made the characterisations more credible I felt.
I've been binging recently on the Desi Arnez / Lucille Ball story. I'm currently listening to an excellent TCM podcast on their lives and careers , Season 3 of "The Plot Thickens" if you want to look it up and have also just watched Amy Poehler's archival documentary "Lucy and Desi" so I guess it was inevitable that I would end up at Aaron Sorkin's movie which intertwines a key week for the couple at the height of their fame with a potted history of their time together and experiences in Hollywood.
It's 1952 and they're at the height of their fame but Lucy and Desi are confronted with and have to face up to not one but three crucial events in their lives. Firstly, Lucy's fury at the widely-read "Confidential" magazine's front-page exposé of Desi's philandering lifestyle, then a potentially even more damaging revelation by coast-to-coast broadcaster Walter Winchell of Lucille's past sympathy with the Communist Party, this when the Red Scare in Hollywood was also peaking and finally the news that Lucy herself was pregnant again and the ramifications of this for their runaway success TV show "I Love Lucy".
My foreknowledge of events probably helped me to follow the action and I was thus able to recognise the sequence of events depicted even as I recognised in places the dramatic licence inevitably taken in some cases by Sorkin. Probably the most unusual plot-point he employs in the film is Lucy's insistence on effectively rewriting the next episode of the show, which while done to no doubt demonstrate Ball's intelligence and insight into how comedy works is also used to highlight her deflection of all the combined trauma of these potentially career-threatening incidents.
Try as I could, I just wasn't convinced by Nicole Kidman as Lucy. For me, she doesn't nail Ball's distinctive appearance or voice. Javier Bardem's Desi I felt was a better fit, his swarthy good looks and natural Latin-tinged accent worked better in his portrayal of Desi. J. K. Simmon's part as "I Love Lucy" co-star William Frawley on the other hand to be afforded over-prominence to me, do much so that it almost like a directorial sop to the actor himself. I also felt the recreated modern-day anecdotal interviews of the actual show's producer and writer to be distracting rather than helpful.
Sorkin's direction is stylish if prosaic at times as he carefully overlays his interlinked narratives. I also felt his dialogue sometimes came over as often unrealistic and stylised, with almost every line uttered by his characters straining for pith, wit and of course humour. I personally doubt that comedians and script-writers are always so erudite, a bit more mundanity would have made the characterisations more credible I felt.
Nevertheless, he brings all his elements to a suitably dramatic conclusion ending on a final shot which somehow reminded of one used by Orson Welles in "Citizen Kane's" opera scene. Interesting to watch as it was, in the end however, I'd have to conclude by saying that I liked rather than loved this portrayal of Lucy.
Nevertheless, he brings all his elements to a suitably dramatic conclusion ending on a final shot which somehow reminded of one used by Orson Welles in "Citizen Kane's" opera scene. Interesting to watch as it was, in the end however, I'd have to conclude by saying that I liked rather than loved this portrayal of Lucy.
It's 1952, they're at the height of their fame but Lucy and Desi are confronted with and have to face up to not one but three crucial events in their lives. Firstly, Lucy's fury at the widely-read "Confidential" magazine's front-page exposé of Desi's philandering lifestyle, then a potentially even more damaging revelation by coast-to-coast broadcaster Walter Winchell of Lucille's past sympathy with the Communist Party, this when the Red Scare in Hollywood was also peaking and finally the news that Lucy herself was pregnant again and the ramifications of this for their runaway success TV show "I Love Lucy".
My foreknowledge of events probably helped me to follow the action and I was thus able to recognise the sequence of events depicted even as I recognised in places the dramatic licence inevitably taken in some cases by Sorkin. Probably the most unusual plot-point he employs in the film is Lucy's insistence on effectively rewriting the next episode of the show, which while done to no doubt demonstrate Ball's intelligence and insight into how comedy works is also used to highlight her deflection of all the combined trauma of these potentially career-threatening incidents.
Try as I could, I just wasn't convinced by Nicole Kidman as Lucy. For me, she doesn't nail Ball's distinctive appearance or voice. Javier Bardem's Desi I felt was a better fit, his swarthy good looks and natural Latin-tinged accent worked better in his portrayal of Desi. J. K. Simmon's part as "I Love Lucy" co-star William Frawley on the other hand to be afforded over-prominence to me, do much so that it almost like a directorial sop to the actor himself. I also felt the recreated modern-day anecdotal interviews of the actual show's producer and writer to be distracting rather than helpful.
Sorkin's direction is stylish if prosaic at times as he carefully overlays his interlinked narratives. I also felt his dialogue sometimes came over as often unrealistic and stylised, with almost every line uttered by his characters straining for pith, wit and of course humour. I personally doubt that comedians and script-writers are always so erudite, a bit more mundanity would have made the characterisations more credible I felt.
I've been binging recently on the Desi Arnez / Lucille Ball story. I'm currently listening to an excellent TCM podcast on their lives and careers , Season 3 of "The Plot Thickens" if you want to look it up and have also just watched Amy Poehler's archival documentary "Lucy and Desi" so I guess it was inevitable that I would end up at Aaron Sorkin's movie which intertwines a key week for the couple at the height of their fame with a potted history of their time together and experiences in Hollywood.
It's 1952 and they're at the height of their fame but Lucy and Desi are confronted with and have to face up to not one but three crucial events in their lives. Firstly, Lucy's fury at the widely-read "Confidential" magazine's front-page exposé of Desi's philandering lifestyle, then a potentially even more damaging revelation by coast-to-coast broadcaster Walter Winchell of Lucille's past sympathy with the Communist Party, this when the Red Scare in Hollywood was also peaking and finally the news that Lucy herself was pregnant again and the ramifications of this for their runaway success TV show "I Love Lucy".
My foreknowledge of events probably helped me to follow the action and I was thus able to recognise the sequence of events depicted even as I recognised in places the dramatic licence inevitably taken in some cases by Sorkin. Probably the most unusual plot-point he employs in the film is Lucy's insistence on effectively rewriting the next episode of the show, which while done to no doubt demonstrate Ball's intelligence and insight into how comedy works is also used to highlight her deflection of all the combined trauma of these potentially career-threatening incidents.
Try as I could, I just wasn't convinced by Nicole Kidman as Lucy. For me, she doesn't nail Ball's distinctive appearance or voice. Javier Bardem's Desi I felt was a better fit, his swarthy good looks and natural Latin-tinged accent worked better in his portrayal of Desi. J. K. Simmon's part as "I Love Lucy" co-star William Frawley on the other hand to be afforded over-prominence to me, do much so that it almost like a directorial sop to the actor himself. I also felt the recreated modern-day anecdotal interviews of the actual show's producer and writer to be distracting rather than helpful.
Sorkin's direction is stylish if prosaic at times as he carefully overlays his interlinked narratives. I also felt his dialogue sometimes came over as often unrealistic and stylised, with almost every line uttered by his characters straining for pith, wit and of course humour. I personally doubt that comedians and script-writers are always so erudite, a bit more mundanity would have made the characterisations more credible I felt.
Nevertheless, he brings all his elements to a suitably dramatic conclusion ending on a final shot which somehow reminded of one used by Orson Welles in "Citizen Kane's" opera scene. Interesting to watch as it was, in the end however, I'd have to conclude by saying that I liked rather than loved this portrayal of Lucy.
Nevertheless, he brings all his elements to a suitably dramatic conclusion ending on a final shot which somehow reminded of one used by Orson Welles in "Citizen Kane's" opera scene. Interesting to watch as it was, in the end however, I'd have to conclude by saying that I liked rather than loved this portrayal of Lucy.