Rosaline

Movie Name: Rosaline
Year of Release: 2022
Director: Karen Maine
Starring: Kaitlyn Dever, Isabela Merced, Minnie Driver, Christopher McDonald, Sean Teale, Kyle Allen, Spencer Stevenson, Bradley Whitford, Nico Hiraga, Alistair Toovey, Alhaji Fofana, Mercedes Colon, Nicholas Rowe
Score out of ten (whole numbers only): 4
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Synopsis and Review

Karen Maine's feature directorial debut, "Yes, God, Yes", made a considerable splash upon its release, and "Rosaline" is in fact her sophomore feature. The film is an adaptation of the book from Rebecca Serle, which is in turn inspired by the events of William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet". The film focuses its attention on Rosaline, whom we discover is a strong willed and opinionated young woman from the House Capulet. She's been secretly dating Romeo, a member from the House Montague, the rival house to hers. She misses a ball where she was meant to have a rendez-vous with him, since her father has been trying to find her a suitable husband. Romeo in the interim, meets Rosaline's cousin, Juliet, and becomes smitten by her. Rosaline soon discovers he is persistently going after Juliet. Rosaline attempts to court Romeo back, by spreading some rumors to her cousin about his philandering, while also introducing her to other potential available suitors. Juliet eventually discovers what Rosaline has been doing, becomes enraged, and distrustful of all her actions. Rosaline discovers a letter from Romeo to Juliet asking her to elope with him. She tries to thwart these plans with Dario, the young man her father tried to set her up with. While they both fail, things escalate from then on, when Romeo and Juliet's marriage is uncovered by their respective families.

The attempts to modernize or capitalize on the works of William Shakespeare are almost as frequent as the adaptations of his works themselves. However for every successful take, such as Baz Luhrmann's "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet", there's those slightly less accomplished ones such as Michael Almereyda's "Hamlet", to name but two examples. "Rosaline" doesn't fall on either one of those sides, but rather a bit in between: it's not terribly memorable, but thankfully it's not purely terrible either. The film's saving grace is in reality the always fantastic Kaitlyn Dever, a performer who manages to move seamlessly between drama and comedy, with a perfect timing across all the parts she decides to tackle (and she's a terrific singer as well). The modernization of the Shakespearean lore in this film almost works, even if at times the film does feel a bit like the cast of "Booksmart" is attempting to do a rendering of one of the plays of the bard. There's a bit of a disconnect that permeates throughout the film: Rosaline is the one who functions as the main bridge of modernity from the audience towards the classicism of the words and actions that are taking place, which means that whenever she's not on screen the film retreats to something that lacks spark, and frankly, talent to hold our attention. What we're left with is a slight and occasionally funny film, mostly brought to life by Kaitlyn Dever. The creative team tries to make the feature into a feminist statement, particularly in the last chapter, however it feels bland, lacking impact, and ultimately failing in bringing more life into these characters and situations. The supporting cast features good performances from the always underrated Minnie Driver, Bradley Whitford, and Christopher McDonald. The production team is competent, with the biggest highlight going for the costumes from Mitchell Travers. This is watchable for Kaitlyn Dever's talent alone, but she deserves better vehicles than these.