AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

PodBill Just what I expected

Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Dana An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

paulclaassen It is rare that one finds a film that is a comedy, drama and musical all in one and great in all genres. The humor is seriously funny, the drama very dramatic and sad at times, and the musical element vibrant, flamboyant and daring. The film simply would not have been the same without Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins in the lead. They are FANTASTIC together! I thought Will Young was also very good, and he even gave us a peek-a-boo at his bum! (Well, erm, Bob Hoskins did more than that...). All elements of the film work in perfect harmony to bring a thoroughly enjoyable masterpiece. This is one of my all-time favorite films.

Michael Ledo The opening credits have the appearance of a 1960's comedy. While this movie is clever and witty, I would place it into a drama category that uses humor to prevent dry boring material. The movie has nudity, but it is not erotic. In a compromise solution, nudity is allowed only if the girls never move while on stage, i.e. act as statues.

Tarma T I marked this review for spoilers, but I'd like to reiterate that I do spoil a major character ending further on in this review. Don't read after the next paragraph if you want to avoid.Watching Bob Hoskins and Judi Dench on screen together was, I admit, extremely satisfying. Their characters are fun and funny and they manage to make two characters with quite prickly exteriors very likable. Oh, and let me not forget the scenes with Dench and Christopher Guest, which range from cute to hysterical. As for the film itself, the music is good, the sets pretty, but I was in the end not very satisfied with it. Having said that, and before I go onto that rather large spoiler, I must note that I still rewatch it on occasion specifically because the flaw of the movie doesn't overpower my love of watching Dench, Hoskins and Guest, or the pleasure of the musical numbers, which are very nicely done, and from what I understand accurately reflect the sort of themes the real Van Damm created.Dench and Hoskins' storyline is good, but the side story of Maureen - and how it's worked into Dench's storyline - was just such too mawkish for my tastes. I dislike it when they kill off a character just to drag sentiment into a story - it just feels cheap and tends to dampen my enjoyment of a film when that happens. This was a pretty good example of that. There was no real reason for her storyline - her character was sweet, her scenes very pretty, but then she gets offed at the end just so Dench's character can make a pretty little speech that keeps the Windmill from closing down. That, for me, is what takes it from a movie I rate highly and recommend to friends to a movie that I watch for the good parts, but generally don't bother bringing up in recommendation discussions.

secondtake Mrs. Henderson Presents (2005)A terrific story and a straight up, almost stodgy telling of that story. The two main actors—Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins—are so stellar, the movie is a joy to watch. But director Stephen Frears seems determined to not make this dramatic, and so we have a well made but uninvolving kind of filmmaking. The result is fun but disappointing—and the more fun it seems, the more disappointing it is as a movie.The concept is totally winning, and taps into the WWII patriotism of London surviving the Blitz as well as an older woman rising out of recent widowhood to really DO something with her remaining life. And she does, buying an old theater and hiring a man to run it. A musical review (vaudeville) act is established. When this has only temporary success, they launch into the real hook of the theater, and of the movie: nude women (no men) would be used as stage props during the performances.Naturally the men love it, especially the soldiers who flock to the place. Censors find a way to accept it, the public finds a way to love it, and our leading pair charge ahead with their restrained English version of the French theater free-for-all of, say, Moulin Rouge. All of this is great in its own way. Our two leads are developed quite well as characters, though always with a feeling of distance. And the remaining cast is thoroughly kept away from any emotional complexity. Even the troubling issue of several women having to take their clothes off is given modest, unprobing attention, even though that might be the second most powerful part of the movie.The first most powerful aspect is of course the relationship between the leads. It's interesting. You might even say it's predictable, except that it isn't quite. But their mutual respect and mutual wariness of each other personally ends up unchanged from start to finish. That they have a kind of platonic love is the point, but it's really not much of a point.I wanted to love this film and I loved the idea of the film for sure. But the detachment from intensity and depth is astonishing. Even the camera almost never gets close, rarely showing a real expression with any intensity, instead giving the big view. Someone made a stylistic decision to do all this, and make it an explanation of the facts rather than an immersion in them. And it doesn't quite work.