Monday, December 26, 2005

More "Geisha" Damage

A cursory glance at the entertainment headlines this week will guarantee reference to Rob Marshall’s "Memoirs of a Geisha", but closer scrutiny reveals that film critics from all corners have a lot to say about this film - and most of it isn’t good. This page created by the Scotsman Online, posts two of the best criticisms we’ve seen: one by Sarah Kaufman, originally published in the Washington Post on December 15, detailing the errors in costume and dance; and an article by John Horn about the dialect and accent problems in the film. But words like "errors" and "problems" are actually quite inaccurate, dear readers, as you’ll see from these articles... despite anything you’ve heard to the contrary, it was the conscious choice of the director to make this a fictionalized, Westernized Hollywood fantasy story. (comments by J.)