webber-george I just recently watched this film for the first time and was impressed but the film, it was pretty good. The acting was faultless and I must say there was a stand out performance by Abby Cornish. The cinematography was equally of a high standard, there are several scenes where the lighting and atmosphere really help you feel part of the story. I also should give kudos to the costume department, their choices were perfect. Looking at the film itself I should say its a very well told romantic tale the story between Fanny and Keats could so easily have become a more sentimental one. But through a natural dialogue between characters a little bit of humour and good control over the story line Campion has managed to make a really good film. You can feel the emotions coming across and take the emotional journey with the characters throughout. Its just a really nice film.

tieman64 Jane Campion directs "Bright Star". The film is based on the last three years of the life of poet John Keats (Ben Whishaw), and charts his romantic relationship with a young woman, Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish).Like many of Campion's pictures ("Holy Smoke", "The Piano", "In The Cut"), "Bright Star" is both gorgeously directed and erotically charged. Campion's compositions are immaculate, her cinematography precious and the film's lighting oft recalls the faint whites of Johannes Vermeer.Typical of Campion, "Bright Star" also manages to be sexy despite the chastity of its lead characters. Where Campion's "Piano" and "Cut" charged music and words with sexual possibility, in "Bright Star" we're thrown into the world of two lovers who imbue words with an eroticism which their bodies aren't allowed. Separated by tight corsets, social barriers and tradition, Brawne and Keats ravish one another with prose and stanzas, poetry and literature becoming a form of prim foreplay.But Keats and Barwne aren't simply lovers stereotypically boxed in by the social mores of the 19th century. No, both are also a couple of strong-willed, assertive bohemians. Brawne is a fiery proto-feminist who walks at the beat of her own drum, and Keats likewise doesn't give a damn about what anybody thinks or says. This results in a film which breaks away from the conventions of most romantic films set in the 19th century. Rather than a Jane Austenesque tale in which social pressures keep lovers apart, Campion serves up a tale in which two lovers decide to remain apart as an act of both pragmatism and love; Keats refuses to marry Brawne so as not to be a financial burden and Brawne refuses to marry Keats as an act of deference, refusing to get in the way of his poetry. Keats and Brawne's romance may be doomed, but it is doomed because they mutually will it. It is doomed by choice.Campion is one of the few female directors to command a mainstream audience. Virtually all her films are underrated, "Bright Star" included. Arguably Campion's most confidently directed picture, it features an excellent performance by Abbie Cornish, whose difficult role requires a blending of fragility, inexperience, power and agency. Those looking for insights into Keats' life and poetry, however, will be disappointed. Unlike Brawne, Campion's Keats never amounts to anything more than a stereotype. He's a dainty "emo" artist, a giant caricature of a Romantic Poet, and the words which springs from his mouth and pen seems to come from a personality completely at odds with what Campion has sketched. The blunt, mannered prose of Keats is also at odds with Campion's visual beauty, which is gentle, ethereal and delicate. Still, these are minor criticisms. Campion's "Bright Star" is mostly excellent, at least insofar as it echoes the ethos of the Romantic Movement, a movement which arose in the mid 1790s and became unconsciously obsessed with a form of pantheism (seeing the divine in everything), nostalgia, naivety and reacted against Enlightenment principles (most of the famous Romantic artists eventually became giant reactionaries). Campion's Keats is similarly narrow minded, but to Brawne, these fixations make him irresistibly delectable.8/10 – Sumptuous. Worth multiple viewings.

garrettvandrews At its core Campion's Bright Star is an attempt to represent the essence of John Keats. Not an easy task for a director, and doubly difficult for an uninformed viewer. Keats' grave stone in Rome states: "Here lies one whose name was writ in water." Keats never lived to realize his success, he died before becoming famous. Similarly, his poems are accepted as exhibiting the recurring theme of yearning for and perhaps even glimpsing transcendence and immortality but ultimately falling back to earth. Few people are aware that the one exception to this is Keats' masterpiece of a Shakespearean sonnet, "When I Have Fears." A close reading reveals that unlike any other of Keats' works, he not only yearns for but actually reaches and achieves his goal in the heroic couplet. He transcends his mortal body and lives forever.This is why Campion selected "When I Have Fears" within her movie. This is also why, at the movie's climactic end when John Keats and Fanny Brawne must part company, there is nothing physical about that parting: no embrace or kiss, not even a look back. It is an attempt to demonstrate the immortal love Keats achieved - once -.

R Smith I was literally stunned by this film, Campion has crafted another masterwork, and I found myself intensely relieved that I saw it in the comfort of my home rather than in a theatre. As breathtaking as I imagine it would be on the big screen I am sure I would have been removed from the theatre sobbing uncontrollably. At home I even had to pause the film several times because I just needed a break from it, yet I'd go back to it quickly, I was entirely pulled in to the story. Abbie Cornish is a revelation, I'd just seen her in Limitless, unrecognizable as the same actress. The costumes are so memorable I immediately began sketching one of her jackets to replicate (and I've never done that before from watching a period film). The art direction was haunting - like perfect still-life paintings. Fanny's little sister Toots, played by Edie Martin, delighted me every time she appeared on screen. The poetry itself, and how seriously it was taken by the characters, took me back to a seemingly simpler time and I immediately began pulling out long forgotten poetry volumes (my garden hasn't looked the same to me since seeing Bright Star).Bright Star is a must-see.