Bright Star, Dark Matter

Jane Campion’s latest, Bright Star, details the romance between Fanny Brawne and the poet John Keats before his death at age 25. The film promised a chaste yet sizzling love affair, but for those of us expecting Twilight with verse, Bright Star falls a little short. Don’t laugh—we weren’t overreaching to expect vampires in this film considering Keats’ opus, “La Belle Dame Sans Merci” has long been credited for introducing the female vampire figure into Western literature 77 years before Bram Stoker published Dracula. But there is no mention of the succubus in Bright Star, no evil lurking in the forest even though the setting is perfect for such necromancy, the camera following the characters through the damp gray English countryside, a visually sparse but lovely world with brushes of muted, surreal color. The fog, gloam, and withered sedges of Keats’ poem abound onscreen in a style of shooting that recalls the forests of New Zealand in Campion’s masterpiece, The Piano. This earlier work is also about a 19th century forbidden love affair, but The Piano exhibits Campion’s use of nature to draw out the sinister undercurrents of the story, and used music to speak volumes about the characters’ internal transformations, adding an element of depth to the story that we can feel and hear, but not see. Campion attempts to use Keats’ verse in Bright Star to achieve the same emotional dimension, and though Brawne and Keats’ love does create some warmth in the fog, the recitation of poetry does little to arouse an emotional connection the way Ada’s music does in The Piano. Music is visceral, sensate, and immediate, whereas poetry is cerebral—it requires contemplation and multiple readings to be fully appreciated, so when Brawne and Keats recite these words to one another, or when Keats reads a poem through the credits in lieu of music there is undoubtedly something missing for the non-Keats scholars in the crowd.

Abbie Cornish as Fanny Brawne is convincing and heartfelt in her love for Keats, her desperation throughout his failing health is palpable, but there isn’t much tangible chemistry between the two “lovers.” Paul Schneider plays the antagonistic Mr. Brown who provides some clownish comic relief but eventually loses his footing during his big moment.

Despite its foibles, this is a competent and visually soothing film, even if it’s a bit linear and not terribly forceful. However, given Keats’ literary legacy, it could have been more interesting for the film to ask, “Who is this femme fatale?” and more interesting still, to suggest that she could have been…Fanny Brawne. –Christianne Hedtke

Writer/Director: Jane Campion