CHÉRI

By ADA HUTCHINSON

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Whoever doesn't like Michelle Pfeiffer, please leave the room now. One of our most prized actresses, she's had the presence of mind to grow old gracefully, rather than plumping her face. In Chéri, she's decided to, shocker, play old.

The first thing to know about Chéri is that it's based on two books by Colette, a famous, if unheralded, French novelist, perhaps more known for her lesbian affairs than her 50 novels. Colette challenged convention her entire life, and Chéri is no different. As a retiring courtesan (read: whore), Léa (Pfieffer) falls for a much younger Rupert Friend (Chéri). In the parlance of our times, this would be called tadpoling.

Regardless, the film moves slow at first, allowing our eye to soak in the over-the-top set designs and costuming (this is 1906 Paris, after all). Once the romance starts to grip the film, it draws you in, and when Mme. Peloux (the rotund Kathy Bates) arranges a wedding for our dashing lad (to the rowr-worthy Felicity Jones), the film has seduced us much in the way Léa has done so many times before. This is all managed via director Stephen Frears and Christopher Hampton (screenplay) who previously worked with Pfieffer in the devilishly delicious Dangerous Liaisons. And if you haven't seen it, queue that shit up right now.