The movie "Nine"

It was really hard to finish this movie. I have seen more than a dozen lives musicals and can recite entire soundtracks in my head on long road trips. So, it was with alot of excitement I began the film "Nine" today. By the end, I was alternatively bored to tears, somewhat involved, mildly amused, and appropriately distracted by all the shimmies, cool cat soundtrack, sexy romps and of course, Judi Dench. I was going to write in detail about this movie, because I thought it would be as wonderful as "Chicago" which Rob Marshall also directed.

However, it is not to be. Daniel Day Lewis is a great actor but somewhat too broody for his role as Guido, an Italian director who hits a creative snag while trying to make his ninth highly anticipated film. I Think Antonio Banderas played the role on Broadway and I don't know why he wasn't cast in the film. He has a wink-wink humour to his sexiness, like he knows he's cute but would rather be funny. (Smart men know that humor is the way to a woman's heart, because women do the majority of the world's nasty work and we need to giggle, damnit.) Brooding is done well by Lewis, but we don't get alot of comic relief from him, and this is supposed to have humor in it.

There are alot of beauties thrown in for distraction- Nicole Kidman, Penelope Cruz, Kate Hudson, Marion Cottiard (the best of them all). But the single most fun musical number came from an unexpected source- Fergie from the Black Eyed Peas for "Be Italian". Of course, she played a somewhat tranny- looking hooker but she's got the jawbones and arched eyebrows for it. The song rocks, and is the real one moment in the film that feels boldly "Italian". Everything else is just - spaghetti.