Film Review: Notes On A Scandal

Great acting, directing, camera; loved the Foley( as usual). Never bored. Either repelled, fascinated, or enchanted.

Story disturbs on many levels.
Judi Dench plays a Hannibal Lechter of the soul. Bride of Dracula, really. Cate Blanchett's character, Sheba, is portrayed as if David Lynch had been a guest doing a bit of cameo directing. The character is profound, yet presented as shallow. Judi Dench's Sappho from Hell character, who is the obsessive note writer, describes her as shallow, but a cursory survey of the elements in Sheba's life compells us to denounce this as a lie.
The entire film is based on our complicity with the Denchian Sappho and we are forced to focus on Sheba's sin with a 15 year-old boy and not see anything else. Sin and sensuality is the only thing that is not shallow. All is ennuie, all is accidie except the pleasant stroking of naked skin.

The story is in its essence a frantic romp of sensuality and sin. I got the frenetic feeling of an anti-burlesque A Nasty Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum, everything occurring at a fevered pitch and a serio-comedy where Plautus bared his fangs. It was either Sylvester Stallone on Shakespearean English, or it was Two Gentlemen of Verona as interpreted by Thomas Harris (The Silence of the Lambs).

You know, I just may go see it again. (Now that I forced myself to write about it, I feel as if I have a glimmer of understanding. Note this important point: Understanding comes from a variety of conscious behaviors. We need not merely view, we must write; we need not solely write, we need to act, to feel, to do all those things which renders us human and our understanding divine.)

--