Stardust: Thoughts

Matthew Vaughn’s long gestating fantasy epic, Stardust, would love to be elevated to the venerable heights of that other classic fantasy film full of expertly timed cameos—The Princess Bride (itself recently turned 20, huzzah!); and try as Stardust does to attain such sweet heights, it falls short…but just barely. Sadly, the energy propelling Stardust is far too reliant on the well timed appearance of Hollywood A-listers (Robert DeNiro, Peter O’Toole, Michele Pfeiffer, and, heck, Ricky Gervais), unlike The Princess Bride, which was propelled by the introduction of stable-boy Wesley and the subsequent wonderfully long-winded chase of the Dread Pirate Roberts and his quest to steal Princess Buttercup back from formidable Sicilian intellectual Vizzini (the iconic Wally Shawn), Wesley/Roberts and Buttercup were played by relative unknowns, Cary Elwes and Robin Wright (soon to be, Penn). Whereas The Princess Bride was a rare example of cinematic fusion—sweetness made manifest; Stardust is irony made corporal, a fact due, in large part, to the very existence of The Princess Bride, making it almost disingenuous to talk about Stardust as if it weren’t attempting to cast a direct shadow over the past (much the way Bay’s Transformers attempted to do with Spielberg’s Jurassic Park 2). If Stardust offers up something unique, it’s the film’s adoption of the liberal awakening currently being found in the childhood fantasy epic, something simplistically hinted at in the Harry Potter series, but attacked full-force in Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials Trilogy. No longer is the literary fantasy epic dominated by the traditional biblical allegory, nor are such films still rooted in the conservative ethos of Regan-era Hollywood (something, regardless of its intent, The Princess Bride was). But all of this is just politics. In the end, Stardust’s attempt to become a pop-cultural, generational, phenomenon will be based solely on its contributions to the genre and what it gives us that we haven’t seen in fantasy.

Those contributions include the sporadic Claire Danes and Charlie Cox, who, before trading in his British bob-cut for a mane of virile locks, looks too much like Sam Rami on the floor of Comic-Con. The plot concerns Cox’s young adventurer, Tristan, and his quest to return a fallen star to his (temporary) “true love” Victoria (Sienna Miller—slumming it here). During his adventure, Tristan and Yvaine (the star: Danes), encounter the evil witch Lamia (Pfeiffer), a prince and the ghosts of his slain brothers (one of the more humorous bits in the film), and, being summer of ’07, instead of ’87—you guessed it… a gay pirate (DeNiro)! Along the way, Tristan (of course) learns what love is really all about (so liberal! so willing to learn!), unlike young Wesley, who from the opening moment of The Princess Bride, never had to learn (so conservative! so resolved!). It’s this paramount cliché that prevents Stardust—unlike the unwavering unapologetic decency of Bride—from elevating itself to the heights of Bride. In the end, despite all the fancy spells (read: CGI), there’s no such thing as magic as leaps of faith are prohibited and treated skeptically. It’s just Hollywood, baby. Hollywood.