Starring: Annette Bening, Ed Harris, Robin Williams
The Face of Love
Director: Arie Posin
Rating: 2/5
Annette Bening is one of the finest actresses of her generation and has returned with her new film The Face of Love, which sees her team up with director Arie Posin for the first time.
The Face of Love sees Posin return to the director's chair for the first time since he made his debut with The Chumscrubber back in 2007.
The Face Of Love is the story of a widow named Nikki (Bening) who, several years after the loss of her husband Garrett, meets a man named Tom (Harris) who looks exactly like her deceased husband.
Suddenly, a flood of old feelings rush back to her: she's met the love of her life. Again. The film is a romantic story filled with humour, surprise, and reflections on the mystery of love surrounding us. Bening and Harris star, with an important supporting turn from Robin Williams as Nikki's confidante and would-be lover.
Bening and Harris both give a terrific central performance and you really do feel that they have poured their heart, soul and a whole load of emotion into the characters of Nikki and Tom.
The Face of Love is well worth a look just to see the performance from Bening and Harris - Williams is also terrific in what is one of the final performances of his acting career. However, it is the script that really does let these fine actors down - to say it is a little contrived and creaky would be a bit of an understatement.
In lesser hands, The Face of Love would be a movie that you would avoid altogether, but the talent of Bening and Harris do manage to keep this film together and on course. The story was just a little bit to soapy for my liking but the script really is lifted by the emotional and powerful performances by the two lead actors.
This is a film that does explore themes of grief and obsession, and what is so frustrating is that it could have been so much more if those actors had been given more to get their teeth into in terms of the script.
Sadly, The Face of Love does descent into melodrama and the power that this story could have had really does get lost along the way, which is a major shame.
The Face of Love does have its moments and Bening and Harris are terrific, but that does not stop this movie from sailing a little off course.