By the Sea *** (2015, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Mélanie Laurent, Niels Arestrup, Melvil Poupaud, Richard Bohringer) – Movie Review

Patience is required, and somewhat rewarded, for Angelina Jolie’s 2015 work as writer, director and star of this intense, serious but plush and sedate romantic drama, mysteriously set in France during the mid 1970s.

Jolie casts herself as stylish but troubled former dancer Vanessa and her real-life husband Brad Pitt as her screen husband Roland, an American writer. They arrive by trendy car by the sea in a quiet, seaside town, where their very comfortable hotel has a nice balcony with a lovely view and interesting next-door neighbours.

The couple are squabbling and growing apart, what with her unable to have a baby and him not knocking out fiction masterpieces as he’d like. Roland takes to the bottle in local bar-cum-café, where the bar-keeper is worldly and wise, and interestingly played by Niels Arestrup in the film’s best performance.

Though gorgeous, Vanessa is unfortunately so languid and boring and unpleasant that you can’t see Roland’s attraction to her. But, hey, love is blind, and Roland sees Vanessa’s well-disguised inner beauty as well as outer. Roland turns into a slightly unpleasant drunk, when the bar-keeper asks him to go home, and has a silly moustache, but otherwise he seems a perfect kind of bloke that anyone would adore.

Anyway, Vanessa gets increasingly nasty as Roland meets up with Lea (Mélanie Laurent), the wife of the couple in the next room. But Vanessa cheers up enormously when she discovers a hole in the wall of their bedroom that lets both Vanessa and Roland spy on the couple’s love-making activities. In some strange, subtle, indefinable way, this seems to bring Vanessa and Roland back to life and back together.

It’s not much of a story for two hours, but Jolie somehow manages to keep it involving enough, with Pitt doing good acting work, and out-acting her, in admittedly a better role. The 70s atmosphere is there on screen, in the styles of the clothes and hair cuts, as well as period artefacts like Brad’s typewriter and the couple’s car. Jolie films her 70s style story like it’s a 70s style French movie.

This oddball film is probably not everyone’s tasse du té, but it’s reasonably tasty and fragrant. Fans of Jolie and Pitt, separately or together, will need to see it. It’s only their second film together, after Mr and Mrs Smith. It’s a must just for that. And if it recalls Eyes Wide Shut, with another famous screen married couple, why not?

© Derek Winnert 2015 Movie Review

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com