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Movies / On DVD / Sylvia
Sylvia

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Sylvia (2003)

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Reviews Counted:124

Fresh:45

Rotten:79

Average Rating:5.3/10

Consensus: This biopic about Sylvia Plath doesn't rise above the level of highbrow melodrama.

Rated: R [See Full Rating] for sexuality/nudity and language

Runtime: 1 hr 50 mins

Genre: Dramas

Theatrical Release:Oct 17, 2003 Limited

Box Office: $1,235,406

Synopsis: Academy Award winner Gwyneth Paltrow stars in Sylvia as legendary American author and poet Sylvia Plath, opposite Daniel Craig as British Poet Laureate Edward (Ted) Hughes. Sylvia explores the... Academy Award winner Gwyneth Paltrow stars in Sylvia as legendary American author and poet Sylvia Plath, opposite Daniel Craig as British Poet Laureate Edward (Ted) Hughes. Sylvia explores the source of creative genius, and love in all its passions. Ted and Sylvia were a sensual, volatile, and brilliant married couple who emerged as two of the most influential writers of the 20th century. The film begins in 1956. Sylvia is in England on a Fulbright Scholarship when she meets Ted. The attraction is immediate and mutual. It is a meeting not only of the minds, but of an intense physicality as well. Within four months, they are married. When her studies are completed, Sylvia is offered a teaching post back in America. She accepts, and the couple relocates. A working wife, Sylvia must also tend to her unique voice or risk losing it. The newly published Ted attracts the attention of the literary world, along with the attentions of admiring women. Retuning to England in the late 1959, Sylvia and Ted attempt to renew their commitment, first with the birth of one child and then another. But as the marriage frays anew and Ted's literary stature overshadows her own, Sylvia's creative impulses surge. She funnels her fury and passion into her work, and her writing begins to flow forth in unstoppable bursts. "I really reel like God is speaking through me," she exults. Her destiny -- and Ted's, inextricably intertwined with hers -- is at hand... -- © Focus Features [More]

Starring: Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Craig, Jared Harris, Blythe Danner

Starring: Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Craig, Jared Harris, Blythe Danner, Michael Gambon

Director: Christine Jeffs

Director: Christine Jeffs
Screenwriter: John Brownlow
Producer: Alison Owen
Composer: Gabriel Yared
Studio: Focus Features

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Release:

Feb 10, 2004

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Reviews for Sylvia

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81 - 100 (sorted by date)
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Full Review Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch | comment Comment
10/24/03
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Both Rain and Sylvia are shaky in the storytelling department, but both take advantage of Jeffs' strong visual sense to make up for flaws in the script.

Full Review Source: St. Paul Pioneer Press | comment Comment
10/24/03
Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
St. Paul Pioneer Press

Odd that a story of two such hot-burning lives as Plath and Hughes could leave us so cold.

Full Review Source: Denver Post | comment Comment
10/24/03
Michael Booth
Michael Booth
Denver Post

Jeffs' movie flashes too little poetic lightning of its own.

Full Review Source: Denver Rocky Mountain News | comment Comment
10/24/03
Robert Denerstein
Robert Denerstein
Denver Rocky Mountain News
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The filmmakers' morbid preoccupation with the grim circumstances of Plath's downward spiral throws Sylvia off balance and into the realm of highbrow melodrama.

Full Review Source: Reel.com | comment Comment
10/24/03
Timothy Knight
Timothy Knight
Reel.com

Offers a wondrously illuminating artistic experience for its ideal audience -- people like me who know a little but not much about the explosive Plath-Hughes fusion of unbridled poetic temperaments in a tauntingly prosaic world.

Full Review Source: New York Observer | comment Comment
10/23/03
Andrew Sarris
Andrew Sarris
New York Observer
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

I have seen many awful author biopics ("Iris" being especially terrible) but I can’t think of one that I have loathed as much as I loathe 'Sylvia'...

Full Review Source: Critic Doctor | comment Comment
10/23/03
Peter Sobczynski
Peter Sobczynski
Critic Doctor

Paltrow successfully transmits Plath's mental distress and her desperation to shake off a mounting depression.

Full Review Source: Arizona Republic | comment Comment
10/23/03
Bill Muller
Bill Muller
Arizona Republic
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

So suffocating, so lugubrious is the film that Sylvia didn't need to gas herself to death. Jeffs deprives her of oxygen.

Full Review Source: Philadelphia Inquirer | comment Comment
10/23/03
Carrie Rickey
Carrie Rickey
Philadelphia Inquirer
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

No one expects this to be the feel-good show of the year, but Jeffs' approach is so maudlin that by the end, Plath won't be the only one who's depressed.

Full Review Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune | comment Comment
10/23/03
Jeff Strickler
Jeff Strickler
Minneapolis Star Tribune

Sylvia's emotional moods should swing from red-hot passion to icy rage. Instead, the movie runs the gamut from tepid to lukewarm.

Full Review Source: Dallas Morning News | comment Comment
10/23/03
Philip Wuntch
Philip Wuntch
Dallas Morning News
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

It's a dreary movie about a dreary character, offering little insight into her poetry or the mental illness that ultimately conquered her.

Full Review Source: Chicago Tribune | comment Comment
10/23/03
Mark Caro
Mark Caro
Chicago Tribune
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

...a surface treatment of the life and -- most frustratingly -- death of American poet and author Sylvia Plath.

Full Review Source: Sun Publications (Chicago, IL) | comment Comment
10/23/03
Josh Larsen
Josh Larsen
Sun Publications (Chicago, IL)

... more or less take the Hughes line, evoking, through testy dialogue and alternately claustrophobic and idyllic mise en scene, the continuing challenge, and occasional delirium, of marriage to a brilliant manic-depressive.

Full Review Source: L.A. Weekly | comment Comment
10/22/03
Ron Stringer
Ron Stringer
L.A. Weekly

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Hollywood.com | comment Comment
10/22/03
Hollywood.com

While the movie may inspire some viewers to read (or reread) her work, it may lead others to wonder whether to stay for the whole movie, given that the characters aren't particularly likable or interesting and the ending is already known.

Full Review Source: Journal News (Westchester, NY) | comment Comment
10/22/03
Marshall Fine
Marshall Fine
Journal News (Westchester, NY)

Gwyneth Paltrow delivers an affecting, understated performance as the overwrought Plath.

Full Review Source: Film Journal International | comment Comment
10/22/03
Rex Roberts
Rex Roberts
Film Journal International

It's a little surprising that Sylvia is so conventional, considering that Plath, whatever you think of her work or her life story, openly defied plenty of the '50s conventions.

Full Review Source: Salon.com | comment Comment
10/22/03
Stephanie Zacharek
Stephanie Zacharek
Salon.com
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

May provide additional insights for those with an intimate knowledge of Sylvia Plath's aching poetry. For anyone else, it's a waste of time.

Full Review Source: SPLICEDWire | comment Comment
10/22/03
Rob Blackwelder
Rob Blackwelder
SPLICEDWire

A rather amazing movie on its own terms.

Full Review Source: New Times | comment Comment
10/22/03
Gregory Weinkauf
Gregory Weinkauf
New Times
 
 
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