CinePhillyist Reviews... Penelope

Penelope is explicitly a modern fairy tale—even to the point of opening with "Once upon a time..." and ending with "...and they lived happily ever after"—about a young woman named Penelope (Christina Ricci), who is cursed. Her family is very old and very rich, and many years ago, a male of their number thought he'd fallen in love with a washerwoman, but ultimately broke his promise to marry her. When the woman subsequently committed suicide, her mother, a witch, put a spell on the family so that the next daughter of their line would be born with the face of a pig. Penelope is that daughter, and the only way she can break the curse is to find true love with one of her own kind. Her mother, Jessica (Catherine O'Hara), is determined to achieve this for her, and so fakes her daughter's death and then locks her away in the family mansion and brings handsome blue-blooded males in one by one, always hoping the next one will be the first to look upon Penelope's face and not run away screaming in terror.

But alas, none of the men can seem to get past Penelope's pig nose. After they've seen it, they're always sworn to secrecy so no one will know the truth about Penelope and the family's curse. But one fateful day, one of the snobby, rich bastards, who goes by the name Edward Vanderman Jr. (Simon Woods), gets away and goes to the press. Only one reporter—a man named Lemon (Peter Dinklage)—believes his story. And that's only because Lemon has a history with the family. He tried to get a picture of Penelope when she was a baby and got his eye poked out by her mother for his trouble. Now that he's learned the girl's still alive, he's even more determined to get a picture of her. So he and Edward hire a down-on-his-luck blue-blood named Max (James McAvoy)—who has a serious gambling habit, and the serious gambling debts to go with it—to sneak into the house disguised as a potential suitor and snap a photo of Penelope with a hidden camera. But during his daily conversations with Penelope through a two-way mirror, Max starts to get to know her, and things don't end up going as planned for anyone.

This is the first feature length film for director Mark Palansky and screenwriter Leslie Caveny, but you wouldn't know it from how polished their work looks here. The film may sound a bit formulaic, but in fact it's loaded with twists and turns and wonderful surprises. It's a little heavy on the narration early on, but the writing is so funny and clever that it's not really annoying at all. In fact, the only real problem with the film is that Christina Ricci is not ugly enough. Sure, she's got a pig nose, but it really doesn't seem awful-looking enough to explain why grown men would run screaming and jump out windows at the mere sight of her.

Still, I get what they're going for, and it works well enough. It helps that all the acting in the film is excellent. Speaking of which, you may have seen Reese Witherspoon on the poster over there, and are perhaps wondering why I haven't even mentioned her yet. It's because her part is so surprisingly small; she doesn't even appear until the movie is about two-thirds of the way over. Still, because she's good at what she does, she quickly establishes herself as Penelope's goofy, talkative new buddy. (Did I mention she's also a producer on the film? That's one talented lady.)

Richard E. Grant also has a small but amusing part as Penelope's father ("But I like bacon!"). Catherine O'Hara is spot-on brilliant as Penelope's smotheringly over-protective mother. And McAvoy is completely likable as Max. But perhaps one of the most fascinating characters is Dinklage's. If you didn't know, Dinklage is a little person, but one of the interesting and refreshing things about the film is that that fact never comes up. Of course, it's certainly suggested that his stature has some part in explaining why Lemon is able to suddenly sympathize with Penelope later in the film. But that suggestion is made with expert subtlety.

The message of the film as a whole... is actually kind of a spoiler. So I won't explicitly state it. Suffice it to say, it's a great message, delivered in a powerful and moving fashion. And even though the film is a fairy tale, with a happy fairy tale ending, it's also got enough realism, wit, and sarcasm to avoid being unbelievable or mawkish. It's actually quite brilliant, and I highly recommend it.

Image via About.com