A Good Year (2006)

Directed by Ridley Scott. Starring Russell Crowe, Marion Cotillard, Abbie Cornish, Archie Panjabi, Albert Finney, Tom Hollander, Didier Bourdon, Isabelle Candelier, Freddie Highmore, Rafe Spall, Richard Coyle, Kenneth Cranham. [PG-13]

Frivolously touristic change of pace for Ridley Scott is too minor to qualify as a full-blown misfire; he’s made lesser films, but this one ranks among his most anomalous and inessential. Intransigent workaholic Crowe is the sole beneficiary of his late uncle’s French vineyard estate, and he arrives with the intention of selling the property quickly and getting back to the London rat race, but memories of his more carefree youth on summer holidays in the region, as well as a difficult but beautiful café owner (Cotillard) who catches his fancy, make him start appreciating the finer things again at a more relaxed pace. Has nothing new to say, but at least it looks nice while not saying as much; Scott doesn’t have the light touch needed to aerate the trivial material, so it all sits there heavy, like after a big meal (or after too much wine). Awkward tonal shifts run rampant, and the editing rhythms and camera movements sometimes lurch into a frenzy without suitable cause, suggesting that a less ambitious and artistic auteur would have served the breezy, simplistic story better. Screenplay credited to Mark Klein, inspired by a story idea cooked up by Scott and Peter Mayle (subsequently turned into a novel of the same name). Filmed on location, not far from Scott’s home in Provence.

45/100