Visible From Cannes

Ben Whishaw and Abbie Cornish in Bright Star

I may not be in Cannes, but I’ve got long-distance excitement… Bright Star—Jane Campion’s film that depicts the romance of Romantic poet John Keats and his eternally vexing muse, Fanny Brawne. The love affair, while short-lived, surely defines the word ‘romance’—after all we are talking about a poet, Victorian society, the town of Hampstead—the London enclave  known for it’s intellectual residents (Audrey Hepburn included), which should make for  correspondences by way of the fountain pen. In a time when viral dating services are the modern day answer to finding passion, it’s nice to recall a time before winking, poking or tweeting—and the torture the human race endured. For Campion, it’s a long-awaited return to filmmaking as melodramatic as the long stories we crave.