On its release, Penelope made little impression in the film world and went largely unnoticed. I had seen a trailer though and thought the concept seemed rather sweet and endearing. A cursed girl born with pig features tries to find love. Also, the cast list was amazingly impressive, with James McAvoy, Christina Ricci, and Reece Witherspoon, to name but a few. So I gave it a go. The first thirty minutes were extremely enjoyable and very funny, but then the film lost its way and became a bit of a disappointment.

The plot outline is this: many years ago, a member of the rich Wilhern family had an affair with a servant girl. When he announced to his family that he wanted to marry her, they soon made him change his mind, and the distraught lady in question committed suicide. The servant girl’s mother was a witch and put a curse on the Wilhern family. All the girls to be born into the family would be born with pig facial features, and the curse would only be broken when one of her own learnt to love her. To her parents horror, the first female to be born into the family is Penelope (Christina Ricci) and she is born with an inoperable snout.

To avoid tabloids getting hold of the story, penelope’s mother Jessica (Catherine O’Hara) stages Penelope’s death and Penelope is forced to grow up in the confines of her parents’ house and is never allowed to see the outside world. When she becomes an adult, her mother sets to work on attempting to get the curse lifted and starts introducing Penelope to prospective bluebood suitors. She hopes one will learn to love Penelope and lift the curse. On first sight of the pig faced Penelope though, the suitors run away screaming. That is, until Max (James McAvoy) arrives. He finds her charming and does not run away when he sees her face. He does refuse to marry her though, which Penelope assumes means he thinks she’s a monster. Realising that no man will ever love her, Penelope runs away from home and sets out to discover her true self.

There were some incredily funny moments in Penelope, most notably from Richard E.Grant as Franklin, and Peter Dinklage as Lemon. The film’s worth watching, if only for their great comic timing and facial expressions. All the performances in fact were faultless. The film however, was not. Once Penelope runs away from home, the film seems to lose its flow and becomes a bit tiresome to watch. It seems to change direction too fast, as the first thirty minutes set up a love story and then the romance is all but forgotten about as it starts to go down the road of self-discovery. It then back-tracks at the end and tries to bring the romance back, but it just doesn’t seem believable. It’s a shame really, as had the film been less discordant and kept one steady direction, it could probably have become a cult classic.

Dir: Mark Palansky

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