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December 5, 2004
The Life and Death of Peter Sellers
The Roomie and I sat down for a nice evening of HBO Sunday night television. Unexpectedly, the HBO current drama, The Wire, wasn’t on in order that HBO could feature its movie, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers.
I must say, I expected a bit more from the movie, hoping it would be a bit more entertaining. HBO’s preview certainly made it look as if it would be more upbeat. Geoffrey Rush commands a superb performance of the famous actor, his own characters and the brief cutaway scenes wherein Rush portrays various other characters in the movie notwithstanding. But the movie, which I wouldn’t even classify as dark comedy, was ultimately depressing.
Peter Sellers is presented as a childlike and selfish man with no personality of his own who faced anything serious in his life by retreating into characters. The writers show him as a megalomaniac, who only returns to Blake Edwards’ Pink Panther films after he has a series of cinematic failures and is basically broke.
Academy award winning actress Charlize Theron is the opposite of Aileen Wournos, portraying Sellers second wife and 60s starlet, Britt Ekland. Her Swedish “accent” is unconvincing. English character actress Miriam Margolyes does a wonderful job as Peg Sellers, the overbearing mother who created the monster of self and arrogance that Peter Sellers apparently became. The movie also features John Lithgow, playing John Lithgow as Blake Edwards (Geoffrey Rush does a better job at Edwards in a brief cutaway scene), and a decent performance by Stanley Tucci as Stanley Kubrick.
Emily Watson, best known for her Oscar-nominated role in Hilary and Jackie, also has an outstanding performance as Anne Sellers, Peter’s first wife and source of emotional support, long after their divorce.
Ultimately, I would not be surprised if Sellers’ children or any of his wives had a strong hand in the making of this film, given the sympathetic portrayal of both Anne Sellers and Britt Eckland as well as Anne’s children, Michael and Sarah. Although in general, the acting provided award-winning performances, notably by Rush, this movie should be included in a long line of bitter, posthumous bio-epics that began with Mommie Dearest.
If you are a great fan of Geoffrey Rush, and want to watch one of the performances of his life, see The Life and Death of Peter Sellers. If you are, like I am, a huge fan of Peter Sellers' life work, then rent any one of his many motion pictures, but avoid this movie at all cost.
Posted by Bastique at December 5, 2004 11:46 PM
Comments
this post rocks. your blog rocks.
keep rockin.
Posted by: Michael at October 1, 2005 4:13 PM
You are wrong. The Life and Death of Peter Sellers is a film of genius -- wonderfully imaginative and insightful -- and I think it generally enriches our appreciation of the actor's weird talents. Of course I would say this wouldn't I, being the author !
Best wishes, ROGER xxx
Posted by: Anonymous at September 5, 2006 5:33 PM