Cyrano, 2021.
Directed by Joe Wright.
Starring Peter Dinklage, Haley Bennett, Kelvin Harrison Jr, Ben Mendelsohn, Bashir Salahuddin and Monica Dolan.
SYNOPSIS:
An outsider soldier puts his skills as a poet to use as he turns match-maker for the woman he has always loved and an attractive but dull new recruit in his regiment.
Gérard Depardieu. Steve Martin. Peter Dinklage. It’s difficult to imagine a single role which could unite this trio of disparate actors together. Such is the versatility, though, of Cyrano de Bergerac that those are but three of the many actors to have inhabited the literary hero on the big screen. Dinklage plays the lovesick poet in this latest adaptation, directed by Joe Wright and written by Erica Schmidt based on her 2018 stage musical spin on the story.
The basic beats are the same. Cyrano – here dubbed a “freak” for his dwarfism rather than the traditional large nose – nurses an unrequited adoration for his friend Roxanne (Haley Bennett), while her affection is turned to dashing new military recruit Christian (Kelvin Harrison Jr.). But she wants romance from her new beau and he can barely string a sentence together. Determined to make Roxanne happy, Cyrano offers to ghost-write Christian’s letters. “I will make you eloquent,” he says, “while you make me handsome”.
It’s a story which seems to fit the musical format like a glove, in yet another testament to the timeless quality of Edmond Rostand’s original play. Schmidt and Wright’s movie turns musings about love into musical numbers, penned by the National’s twin brothers Aaron and Bryce Dessner. The film’s tracks are mostly low-key in tone, with this songbook dealing more in whispered ballads than the razzle-dazzle approach of belting Broadway toe-tappers.
This plays to the strengths of the cast, with Dinklage excelling with a subtle, fragile musical performance and Harrison Jr. delivering a silky-smooth, honeyed vocal. Perhaps the standout musical turn, though, comes from Ben Mendelsohn as Roxanne’s slimy suitor De Guiche. He growls his villain song with untrammelled aggression and a sneer of confidence, like a caged animal who knows he has the key to the cage. If there’s a weak spot in the ensemble, it’s Haley Bennett, whose take on Roxanne is dialled-up several orders of melodrama beyond those of her castmates. It’s not necessarily a bad performance, but it does feel as if she’s in a different movie.
Dinklage is perfectly cast as Cyrano, giving gravitas to every facet of the character. Anybody who saw him play Tyrion Lannister in Game of Thrones will not be surprised to see the joy and relish with which he delivers Cyrano’s swaggering verbosity, and he also does terrific work conveying the desperate sadness lurking beneath the character’s legendary panache. His eyes are deeply expressive and Wright makes the most of this with plentiful close-ups of his leading man’s pained visage.
There is a sense, though, that it’s all a bit perfunctory. The tale of Cyrano de Bergerac has been told on the big screen so many times that the notion of transposing it into a musical doesn’t feel particularly revolutionary. It’s otherwise simply another jaunt – albeit an enjoyably acted one – through a story we’ve heard before. Compared to other, more inventive adaptations – 2018’s Old Boys, for example, shunts the framework of Cyrano into a modern-ish public school setting – this feels like it has a little too much adoration for the versions that have come before it.
But that’s not to say that this Cyrano isn’t a handsome, deeply enjoyable take on one of literature’s great meditations on love. Anchored by Dinklage at his most witty and soulful and assisted by Wright on less grandiose form than he often can be with his period pieces, it’s a charming night at the movies with a handful of hummable songs in its arsenal. You might not fall head over heels in love, but it makes for an enjoyable serenade.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Tom Beasley is a freelance film journalist and wrestling fan. Follow him on Twitter via @TomJBeasley for movie opinions, wrestling stuff and puns.
