Thursday, April 16, 2015

Albatross (2011)


IMDb plot summary: Beth, a bookish teenager, befriends Emilia, an aspiring novelist who has just arrived in town. Emilia soon begins an affair with Beth's father that threatens to have devastating consequences.
Directed by Niall MacCormick. Starring Jessica Brown Findlay, Felicity Jones, Sebastian Koch, and Julia Ormond.

(Spoilers ahead.)

This is a movie that isn't *bad*, but nor does it really do anything for me. The characters and tropes are very familiar to coming-of-age stories -- a Manic Pixie Dream Friend who helps the shy one out of their shell, a forbidden relationship with a married man, worrying about decisions to go or not go to college. This doesn't add much to it aside from the individual characters or actors, and none of them are particularly noteworthy. (I really don't understand the love for Felicity Jones, I've found her bland or annoying in everything she's been in.) It's a really nice try, but it doesn't offer anything new and I can't connect to the characters, so knowing where everything was going to land made for an uneventful ride.

2 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Albatross < Where the Wild Things Are
Albatross > The Good Doctor
Albatross < Water for Elephants
Albatross > Doc Hollywood
Albatross > Birdman of Alcatraz
Albatross < Fargo
Albatross > Fantastic Mr. Fox
Albatross < The Life of David Gale
Albatross > The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio
Albatross > Compulsion
Albatross > Beverly Hills Cop
Final spot: #1513 out of 2348.

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