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Prime
Prime is pretending to be a fillet steak, but in reality struggles to make burger grade. Prepare for a Prime ribbing.
Having grilled it for a full page, Prime isn't actually as bad as I've made it sound. It is reasonably fun if you're less prejudiced against martini drinkers than I am - it will appeal to much the same band of people as Sideways, but whereas the latter was a very good movie too, with some stunningly subtle performances, Prime can't exceed "acceptable" in any area. It should be called Rump. I enjoyed this film: I think the average moviegoer will enjoy it: Testosterone Satisfaction Rating: - Uma gets briefly to her underwear. If I were a lower form of life than this movie's aimed at, I would comment on the fact that Uma's boobs have gone back to her Dangerous Liaisons peak, so .... well I just did. Damn. To enjoy this film you should be: looking forward to your next dinner party.
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Uma Thurman plays "Rafi" (clearly her full name Raphaelle isn't "movie" enough), a 37-year old newly divorced New Yorker
who starts a fling with 23-year young Bryan Greenberg. Most of the plot revolves around this age difference - with a
very meaty plot complication that I shan't spoil - but they don't look or behave as if there's any age difference at all.
Kudos to Thurman for that - but at the detriment of the movie. My main gripe, however, is more a personal prejudice -
pretentiousness. The director and scriptwriter Ben Younger (also responsible for the surprisingly good Boiler Room)
is trying so hard to convince everyone that he's a smart, savvy Manhattanite that it overpowers the whole movie and leaves
a nauseating aftertaste. They talk art, they talk of obscure musicians, they go to see 60s movies that were cool at the
time. Uma Thurman over-enunciates "ny-eever-TAY", just so we all know that she knows it's spelled naïveté instead of
the plebeian naivety that us regular folk might get along with. If she could've pronounced the umlaut on the i, she
would've. Meryl Streep, the therapist that all such people have, even uses the phrase, "focus on the now," but that might
be an attempt at irony. I never can tell irony when Americans do it, I guess I should look for creases in their clothes.
It's a matter of perspective. The snobbishness of the movie really got on my tits and that tainted my perception of the
remainder, so I scoffed at the casting of real-life cook Madhur Jaffrey as the therapist's therapist when a more tolerant
viewer might have chuckled. I started to notice the cracks in Meryl Streep's usually rock-solid performance where a less
partisan audience would be lauding it. I didn't laugh at the comedy (bar a couple of titters) whereas a dinner party
host may have needed a laundry
change. And you don't give someone a post-sex glow by making their face shiny. AND the dialogue smacks of a teenager
trying to act 30 (and not just from Greenberg, the 26-year old trying to act 23 trying to act 30) - the over-use of the
word "amazing" is a dead giveaway even without the pervasive triteness. But it still manages
to retain some of the fantasy NY lifestyle (Manhattan is actually NOTHING like this, it's actually a refreshingly
down-to-earth city), so it will garner its audience after all. This is a movie that people say they like because they
think they should, and that's all it needs - bums on seats. It's a niche audience, but it's there - and I bet everyone
in that niche couldn't describe any of their friends without using the word "sophisticated".
