I watched Robert Altman’s Gosford Park this past weekend.
As Queen Victoria would have said, I was not amused.
There were some good points and some bad points to the movie, but by far the worst was the dialog. Altman is famous for his layered dialog – where everyone, just like in real (not reel) life, talks at once.
That’s hard to follow sometimes, but it has an effect that is compelling at times.
However, with Gosford Park, it make things almost unbearable because of the content of the dialog. Example follows:
Lady No. 2: “Oh, no. Jespea mummer slamca.”
Servant Girl: “Yes, my Lady. Shall I wruther posip?”
Who the hell was the dialog coach? The same one used for the adult characters in the Charlie Brown cartoons?
I didn’t know what was going on half the time just because of this – and there are a lot of characters to keep track of: Tough to figure out the motives of this or that person if the person’s name appears to be “Shoefulllop” or “Droplegrmmgh.”
Ah well, what do I know? Nominated for movie of the year (2002). So much for my career as movie critic…