I actually found a place in Moscow that runs the occasional English language film--a new release, no less! The Moscow Times (the free English daily distributed at my hotel) alerted me to the fact that Stardust was being shown at one of the main multiplexes here in the city. After I arrived at the cinema and fumbled my way through a ticket purchase with a Russian-speaking clerk, I had to search long and hard for the actual theater in which the movie was playing. Turns out I had to head outside and around to the back of the place, in through a side door and up a back staircase to a small room with maybe 60 seats tucked away in the complex. No matter: I had arrived.
I really wanted to see this particular flick. I am an ardent fan of Neil Gaiman's work, and this movie was based on an illustrated prose piece that was later turned into a short novel, which is what I read maybe 6-7 years ago. I have a very clear memory of reading the prose version of Stardust in a little tea house that I think is called The Oven Door in Dingle, Ireland, while waiting for a group from Choate to arrive later in the day.
In any case, the movie was fresh to me, either because I forgot huge chunks of the book or because the film is sufficiently different from its source material (or maybe both!). There were a few elements in this fairy tale for adults that I remembered, but most of it seemed very new.
In short, this was an absolutely lovely, charming movie--spell-binding in all the ways a good story should be. The visuals in the film were wonderful, and the actors were all up to the task. Charlie Cox and Claire Danes were perfect as the leads. Peter O'Toole had an entertaining cameo, Robert DeNiro was terrific as a ship captain with a secret life, and Ricky Gervais showed provided comic relief playing . . . well, Ricky Gervais, and was very funny. And Sir Ian McKellen was an aptly-cast narrator (though I could not place his naggingly familiar voice until the final credits rolled).
This is a rare film that I'd actually pay to see again in the theater.
