Bright Star

4.00
    Bright Star
    2009

    Synopsis

    In 1818, high-spirited young Fanny Brawne finds herself increasingly intrigued by the handsome but aloof poet John Keats, who lives next door to her family friends the Dilkes. After reading a book of his poetry, she finds herself even more drawn to the taciturn Keats. Although he agrees to teach her about poetry, Keats cannot act on his reciprocated feelings for Fanny, since as a struggling poet he has no money to support a wife.

    Your Movie Library

    Cast

    • Abbie CornishFanny Brawne
    • Ben WhishawJohn Keats
    • Paul SchneiderMr. Brown
    • Kerry FoxMrs. Brawne
    • Edie MartinToots
    • Thomas Brodie-SangsterSamuel
    • Claudie BlakleyMaria Dilke
    • Gerard MonacoCharles Dilke
    • Antonia Campbell-HughesAbigail
    • Samuel RoukinReynolds

    Recommendations

    • 91

      Entertainment Weekly

      Campion's big-sisterly encouragement of Cornish's lovely, openhearted performance -- and Whishaw's well-matched response -- results in a character instantly, intimately recognizable to anyone remembering her own first love.
    • 90

      The Hollywood Reporter

      Bright Star may not be a joy forever but it will do until the next joy comes along.
    • 90

      Variety

      Breaking through any period-piece mustiness with piercing insight into the emotions and behavior of her characters, the writer-director examines the final years in the short life of 19th-century romantic poet John Keats through the eyes of his beloved, Fanny Brawne, played by Abbie Cornish in an outstanding performance.
    • 90

      The New Yorker

      What makes the movie extraordinary, however, is not so much the portrait of a poet as the accuracy and the detail of the period re-creation.
    • 90

      The New York Times

      Ms. Campion, with her restless camera movements and off-center close-ups, films history in the present tense, and her wild vitality makes this movie romantic in every possible sense of the word.
    • 83

      The A.V. Club

      It’s a studied movie that gives itself over to bursts of intensity, and between them sometimes threatens to become as spellbound by its subjects as they become with each other.
    • 80

      New York Magazine (Vulture)

      Young Edie Martin, with her chaotic swarm of red ringlets and deadpan dutifulness (she has few lines, but they’re goodies), is the movie’s sign of eternal spring--the butterfly atop the just-opened blossom.
    • 75

      The Globe and Mail (Toronto)

      Mainly, though, it's the exquisite restraint - both of Cornish's performance and Campion's direction - that gives the film its power.

    Loved by

    Seen by

    Lists