Bel Canto review – Julianne Moore trills as opera star in hostage drama
Moore hits the high notes opposite Ken Watanabe in this soapy adaptation of Ann Patchett’s bestselling novel
Julianne Moore could put a toothpaste advert into awards contention with the inner turmoil she conveys with her magnificent eyes. She certainly lifts her scenes in this slushy heavy on the romance adaptation of Ann Pratchett’s novel about a world-famous opera singer falling in love with a Japanese billionaire during a hostage crisis. If the book is a work of elegant literary fiction, here we have the movie equivalent of a bumper airport paperback: always watchable and often soapy, with a handful of unintentional giggly bits.
Moore is Roxanne Coss, an American lyric soprano paid silly money by the government of a nameless Latin American country to perform at a soiree to impress electronics boss Mr Hosokawa (Ken Watanabe). When leftist guerrillas waving machine guns storm the party, their target is the country’s president, but he stayed home to watch his favourite TV soap opera so the hijackers take the guests hostage instead.