I have the greatest respect for Sofia Coppola.

Ok, rephrase. As a gal who wants to break into direction, it's infuriating that the most successful femme director I can think of has a very famous daddy. Still, it's hard to deny that she's pretty great. I think the first half of The Virgin Suicides is one of the most terrific half-films I've seen since JFK (people keep interrupting me before I can get to the end).

So onto Marie Antoinette, which I respected but did not love. And I'm not sure why.

I don't mind the historical inaccuracies, for example. I liked the stunt casting, the mix of accents and use of modern music. I liked the portrayal of a historical figure as a modern party girl - it made for an interestingly incongruous contrast. It's always nice to see The Past presented as fun, instead of a dry and dusty period drama. I admired the way in which only tiny bits of life outside Versailles filtered through. Because when you study the period, you do get the impression that actually the King was given no idea how bad things really were in France. The plot was not even style over substance - style was the substance. Which I tend to admire in films. You can make trivial, substanceless films which nevertheless do seem to be packed with meaning and depth - Velvet Goldmine is one of them. Events of massive importance are completly downplayed; while time is lavished over balls or the sequence at her house. I like this too. And of course, it was delicious to look at and wonderfully directed.

Yet with all possible criticisms rebutted, and being willing to defend all the dodgy choices she made, I was nevertheless left cold. It was like looking at someone else's Facebook photos - must have been fun; I still wasn't there at the time though...I felt there was something deliberately distancing in the casting of Kirsten Dunst, Rip Torn and Steve Coogan. I simply didn't care. Lost in Translation did this to me too - at the time, I assumed it was because I was feeling homesick, fed up and jetlagged (i was watching it on a plane) and didn't appreciate having those feelings duplicated. Having mentioned it above, I felt that this should have been Velvet Goldmine in wigs. It wasn't.

But what the hell! Just stick it on and drown in the preeety dresses, and looovely buildings, and fantastic direction. No one can beat Sofia Coppola for the pastoral stuff - pay attention whenever the characters are allowed outside. I loved the scene with the sunrise. But maybe that's just because I like sunrises...