Finding Neverland (2004)

Intriguing (partial) biopic of the writer J.M. Barrie. 

Barrie is played unexpectedly well by Johnny Depp. Kate Winslet plays Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, the widow he falls in love with and maintains a platonic relationship with, while becoming a sort of father to her children. In the meantime, he’s working on the Peter Pan play that will make his name, and which is inspired by the family he has become so attached to. 

It’s quite a touching story. “Neverland” works as a metaphor for make-believe/imagination and also for Heaven. There’s a strong performance by Julie Christie, as Sylvia’s strict and frosty mother. Dustin Hoffman is refreshingly unselfconscious as Charles Frohman, the play’s producer. 

It would be easy to criticise the film’s extremely sanitised portrayal of terminal disease, but it’s a story all about the imagination so it therefore seems to make sense that gritty realism is held at bay.

Donnie Brasco (1997)

Crime drama directed by Mike Newell. 

It’s loosely based on the true story of Joseph D. Pistone (played by Johnny Depp), an FBI agent who infiltrates the New York mafia of the 1970. He befriends Lefty Ruggiero (Al Pacino) but finds himself torn between doing his job as an agent and becoming part of the shady world he is attracted by. 

It’s engaging, but somehow not quite as good as it should have been. You wonder if in the hands of Martin Scorsese the same material could have been more skilfully handled. Depp and Pacino are both excellent. 

My favourite scene is when the various meanings of “Forget about it” are discussed. If only there had been more of this subtle, nuanced character-based comedy.

Chocolat (2000)

Romantic comedy-drama. Restless spirit Juliette Binoche and her young daughter arrive in a small and small-minded French town in 1959. She opens a chocolate shop and slowly begins to transform the lives of the locals with the exotic, seductive treats she prepares. The ever-reliable Judi Dench is her cranky old landlady, who suffers from diabetes and family discord. Johnny Depp is a river gypsy, fellow outsider and, inevitably, becomes her love interest. Alfred Molina plays Comte de Reynaud, the repressive mayor who regards everything Binoche does as a threat to his control of the town. Best of all is Lena Olin as the abused wife and pretty thief Josephine, who becomes her friend.

The film is slow to get going and I was close to giving up with it in the first 20 minutes. It eventually draws you in, despite being far from “my kind of thing”. There’s some silly semi-mystical fluff about the north wind, and at times it’s all a bit too polite and simplistic. Binoche uses chocolate like a benevolent drug dealer – part sorcerer, part Nigella Lawson. Plus, it wasn’t very imaginatively shot. There are weighty themes (prejudice vs. tolerance, imprisonment vs. freedom, religious oppression vs. true enlightenment) that might make you think a bit – but only a bit. Binoche is charming and easy to like, ultimately eroding any lingering cynicism.