Tour De Force

Unimaginative and lazy film reviews.

The word "sumptuous" for example. The Guardian is a particular recidivist in this regard. Did a Guardian films search for sumptuous and had 54 results. Granted, some of these referred to Cannes fish lunches and theatre seating plans, but:

Donnie Darko? "Visually sumptuous"
A.I.? "Visually sumptuous"
Original Sin? "Sumptuous"
The Others? Kidman’s clothes…"sumptuous"
The Man Who Cried? "sumptuous"
Madame Bovary? "sumptuous"
The Merchant of Venice? "sumptuous"
Mira Nair’s entire body of work? "sumptuous"
The Bride with White Hair? "sumptuous"
All the Pretty Horses "sumptuous scenery"
La Reine Margot? Christ. "Sumptuous"
Gormenghast? Granted, it’s TV. Fuck it. "Sumptuous"
The House of Mirth? That’s right. "Sumptuous"

And now I tire, but to complete the Guardian reviews we have seemingly anything by Zhiang Yimou.

Hero? "sumptuous"

And what was along the side my 54 search results? A banner for "The House of Flying Daggers" on DVD.

"Sumptuous" said The Guardian.

***** said someone else

"Lavish" said some other knuckledragger

"A masterpiece" someone else probably said and "A tour de force" I’m sure was used somewhere to describe something or other about it. Or maybe that was "Tarnation" or something by Anthony Minghella. (Note the "sumptuous" locations in The Talented Mr. Ripley – according to the Guardian that is)

On the front page of the Guardian film web site even today you’ll find this. And it wasn’t included in my 54 results.

These people get paid to do this. And they get free movies.

However, in the spirit of fair play and just to show that it’s not all the Guardian and that, in fact, they probably aren’t the worst offenders but merely the ones I read the most, check this out.