Somewhere (2010) starring Stephen Dorff, Elle Fanning, Michelle Monaghan, Ellie Kemper, Chris Pontius directed by Sofia Coppola Movie Review

Somewhere (2010)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Stephen Dorff in Somewhere (2010)

The Boredom

Hollywood actor Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff) is a man who needs excitement, he needs to be partying and having sex or else he is bored, seriously bored. Johnny is also the father of 11 year old Cleo (Elle Fanning), well some of the time and when her mother drops her off she tags along with him.

During the first 15 minutes of "Somewhere" there is no dialogue; there is a shot of a Ferrari circling a track a few times and twice we see twin pole dancers who come to Johnny's room, put on a show to help him sleep and then clear off. There is also a scene in a coffee shop as well as a scene of Johnny following a woman in a car. Does any of that sound interesting to you? It doesn't to me and sadly "Somewhere" is one of the most uninteresting and boring movies I have watched.

Now I expected to be challenged as "Somewhere" is a Sofia Coppola movie and she has her own style but it seems here she has gone all the more extreme only to end up more pretentious with every scene dragging on which I guess the purpose of was to make us feel the same level of boredom which Johnny does. If that was the idea it is a clever one but one which fails because after watching a Ferrari circle track for a minute I was thinking what utter nonsense. And sadly there were more scenes of this utter nonsense where Coppola is trying to make us feel something and understand the empty life of Johnny but only comes across as pretentious.

Now I don't know what to make of Stephen Dorff's performance because on one hand he does come across as a bored actor who only seems alive when around others, unable to cope when he is on his own. But on the other hand the character is so dull that it is incredibly hard to feel any warmth towards him. And as "Somewhere" is 90% focused on Johnny it makes it hard work which is only broken when Elle Fanning appears as she brings youthful innocence to the movie.

What this all boils down to is that "Somewhere" just didn't do it for me with Coppola taking her style to a new level but ending up coming across as pretentious by going so extreme with her ideas.


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