Being Julia

Being good

They say that the theatre is all artifice. Maybe they had "Being Julia" in mind when they said it. Adapted from a novella by W. Somerset Maugham, this is an energetic flick about love, revenge and revenge against lovers -- the performances are delightful, and the plot deliciously wicked.

Julia Lambert (Annette Bening) is a fortysomething diva of the London stage (imagine J.Lo in ten years, if she had talent); she acts every moment of the day, lives as if the world is a stage (cue Shakespeare quotes). Despite her phenomenal success, she is depressed -- her husband doesn't light her fire, and her best years are behind her. Soon a younger actress will capture the audience's hearts. What's more, the ghost of her mentor (Michael Gambon) is giving her cues on how to live her actual life.

Then she meets Tom Fennel (Shaun Evans), a handsome young American who claims to adore her. She's enchanted by him, and soon they are in a May-December affair. Suddenly she's filled with new enthusiasm -- and then she finds out that Tom is besotted with a younger actress. With her new stores of joie de vivre, Julia isn't going to get mad -- she's gonna get even.

The most memorable lines from "As You Like It" are undoubtedly: "All the world's a stage,/And all the men and women merely players:/They have their exits and their entrances;/And one man in his time plays many parts." Shakespeare could have written those lines for Julia Lambert, a woman who treats the world as a stage and plays many parts. This wickedly funny comedy actually does one better than the original novella "Theatre," with a tinge of magical realism thrown in.

That magical realism adds a touch of fantasy to a wonderfully theatrical movie. In fact, it feels a bit like a soap opera -- a bejewelled, witty, classy soap opera. Meaning: All the guilty pleasure with none of the embarrassment. Istv�n Szab� tries to drive home the idea that life imitates art and vice versa too often, but otherwise he does a good job. When there is no point to make, he let the plot pick itself up and run.

Bening is in exceptional form here -- she runs the gamut from diva to mum, adoring lover to annoyed wife, witchy star to revengeful victor. And man, is she lovable as she does it -- Julia is a nasty, arrogant person, but Bening gives her such zest and flair that it's impossible to hate her. And she rules the screen -- Jeremy Irons gives a solid performance as her husband, as does Gambon as the late teacher. Evans is a dead presence, but Lucy Punch gives a good performance as a dumb blonde actress who gets in Julia's way.

There's already Oscar buzz about Bening's performance, which isn't surprising -- "Being Julia" is not just delicious, wicked fun, it's also the perfect star vehicle for Bening's talents. A must-see.

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