neumu [ cinematronic ]




	Gosford Park
	Robert Altman Maggie Smith, Michael Gambon, Kristin Scott Thomas, Jeremy Northam, Helen Mirren, Emily Watson, Richard E. Grant, Derek Jacobi, Stephen Fry, Ryan Philippe 2002		Veteran director Robert Altman, late in his career and long in the tooth, turns in a masterful, playful, multi-layered period piece that compares with his finest films. Set in England during the '30s, "Gosford Park" is an upstairs/downstairs inspection of a posh weekend at a country estate lorded over by a heartless, overbearing patriarch. The fact that this rapier-like comedy of manners (with a bit of sex tossed in) eventually turns into a deliciously sordid murder mystery is just a bonus. As in "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," the list of performers here reads like a Who's Who of the British acting community — Maggie Smith, Michael Gambon and Kristin Scott Thomas are some of the upper-crusters; Jeremy Northam is a matinee idol; Helen Mirren, Emily Watson, Richard E. Grant and Derek Jacobi are among the help; and Stephen Fry is a pompous police inspector. Two American actors, Ryan Philippe and Bob Balaban, are aboard as the nouveau riche Yankee contingent, but they rise to the occasion.