mitchellyoung 07/27/2011 (0 of 0 found this helpful)
Rating of 2.5/4
The film seems obsessed with creating a wormy creature of decadence and that it does well. However, in going overboard with the debauchery, it forgets how to tell a clear story and, by having its main character be such a despicable person, it's tough to find someone to root for in the film.
Johnny Depp is a decadent poet/nobleman during the reign of Charles the Sequel. To glorify the high culture of the days, he writes a play featuring dildo's and buggery. Meanwhile, adultry ensues.
Based on real live sex acts.
The Libertine tells the story of the Earl Of Rochester, hedonist and all round cad who scandalized the court of King Charles II. Expecting a saucy period romp bolstered by Johnny Depp's irresistably wicked charm, what I actually got was a bunch of obnoxious dandys sneering at the world in self-consciously dense cod Olde Worlde speak. I've always been suspicious of scripts that involve writers writing about writing as it invariably spirals down into self absorbed pretentiousness; and it seems watching actors act about acting has pretty much the same results. The only attempt to wrest the painfully self-indulgent script from the stage is to wave the camera around in the pseudo documentary style I hate so much and constantly use the kind of sepia-tinted retro filter that the directors of ove...
