Elegy (**½)

Directed by: Isabel Coixet (Paris Je’taime [segment Bastille])
Starring: Ben Kingsley, Penélope Cruz, Patricia Clarkson, Peter Sarsgaard, Dennis Hopper
Seen: January 21st 2009

**½ Out of ****

Elegy: a mournful, melancholy or plaintive poem, especially a funeral song or a lament for the dead.

Dr David Kepesh (Kingsley) is a university lecturer who, after a sexual harassment awareness drive, only dates his students after the grades have been submitted. The first time he sees Consuela Castillo (Cruz), he falls for her in the way schoolboys fall in love, and David, keeping with his “moral” of waiting until after grade submission, arranges the usual cocktail party to have the students over and give him the chance to approach Consuela.

At the party he is slightly aloof, until he sees Consuela and zooms in on her for the rest of the evening, pathetically sitting next to her on the narrow stairwell, having to awkwardly make way every time someone passes by. But then we also see a charming side (at least on Consuela’s eyes) to David, the old man who seduces much younger women. For instance, when she’s uncomfortable with people staring at them, he tells her they can go to his place, where he’ll be the only one staring.

When David is not with Consuela, he is with his friend George O’Hearn (Hopper), who is a famous poet, discussing his romances with his friend, who wants him to not get attached to this girl, but rather exploit her for sex and move on. But David is fascinated by Consuela, and can’t. He falls for her in the worst possible way. He starts to very insecurely follow her around (when she claims to go out with her brother), and this lack of trust puts some strain on a relationship that might otherwise work.

Maybe this lack of trust reflects the fact that he himself is not the most trustworthy person when it comes to matters of love, since he also has a standing arrangement for sex with Carolyn (Clarkson), who could have been a possibility for David’s wife years before, had he not been continuously on the prowl for younger women, one of the functions of his yearly cocktail party for his students.

The level of insecurity David experiences comes to such a level that he regresses to, for at least a moment, an infantile state, and George has to feed him in bed, playing at the spoon being a plane on the way… It is interesting to see such a strong figure as Dr David Kepesh reduced to such tatters by an almost juvenile love that does eventually reach much deeper levels, but it goes a bit too slow. Spanish-English director Isabel Coixet has previously explored the theme of lack of fidelity in an older man who goes after younger women in her segment of the film Paris Je’Taime, and it seems interesting that she has expanded on that theme here, and with so many parallels to that little story.

I would suggest Elegy for fans of Kingsley and Cruz, and for fans of European dramatic cinema, but not a great many people will appreciate the entertainment this offers, which is subtly hidden away behind some understated performances by both Kingsley and Cruz.