Beautiful People (1999)

User Rating:

6.2/10   

Director:

Jasmin Dizdar

Writer:

Jasmin Dizdar (written by)

Release Date:

25 August 1999 (France)

Genre:

Comedy

Tagline:

A comic collision of chaos and coincidence

Plot:

In London, during October 1993, England is playing Holland in the preliminaries of the World Cup. The Bosnian War is at its height...

Plot Keywords:

Heroin | Immigrant | Bosnia Herzegovina | Hospital | Independent Film

Awards:

4 wins & 4 nominations

Cast

Thomas Goodridge	...	Youth with Mobile Phone
Faruk Pruti	...	Croat
Tony Peters	...	Bus Driver
Dado Jehan	...	Serb
Rosalind Ayres	...	Nora Thornton
Julian Firth	...	Edward Thornton
Charles Kay	...	George Thornton
Charlotte Coleman	...	Portia Thornton
Edward Jewesbury	...	Joseph Thornton
Bobby Williams	...	Tim Mouldy
Joseph Williams	...	Tom Mouldy
Nicholas Farrell	...	Dr. Mouldy
Danny Nussbaum	...	Griffin Midge
Steve Sweeney	...	Jim
Jay Simpson	...	Bigsy

MPAA:

Rated R for drug use, language and some violent content.

Runtime:

107 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Australia:MA | France:-12 | Germany:12 | South Korea:18 | Spain:13 | Sweden:15 | Switzerland:12 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:12 (canton of Vaud) | UK:15 | USA:R | New Zealand:R | Iceland:12

Company:

Arts Council of England

Quotes:

Pero Guzina: [thanking his dinner hosts in his broken English] Thank you for your hostility.

Movie Connections:

References "The Munsters" (1964)

Soundtrack:

Enemy Lullaby

It would be an excellent movie, only if...

To me, this is one of the greatest tragedies of 1999. A nice cast and intriguing story have the potential to elevate this to a great piece of work, yet it fails on a couple of fundamental levels. First, _Beautiful People_ is overburdened with cliches: the immigrant who wants to know "the meaning of life," the mortal enemies who have the same shoe size, etc. I found these excessive to the point that they triggered my gag reflex. Second, and more damaging to the film, it is edited extremely poorly. There are simply too many characters and storylines for this director to handle well. By the time a particular storyline comes around again, the audience has completely forgotten it. (Incidentally, this multiple character and storyline trick can be pulled off with great success- Paul Thomas Anderson did a superb job in _Magnolia_). The film does have its high points, in particular the spectacular performance by Charlotte Coleman. Not bad, but that's about all one can say.