"A Good Year" ends in bad disappointment

MOVIEREVIEW "A Good Year" 2 stars If nothing else, "A Good Year" makes you want to get good and drunk after it's done, and that's not just because wine is splattered in every frame. At first it's hard to pinpoint where the movie goes wrong. As a romantic lead, Russell Crowe hits the spot in developing his character from jerk to jovial. As a director Ridley Scott bathes the French countryside setting in lush, tender yellows. And as a screenwriter, Marc Klein breeds a harmless, if a tad familiar, story. Familiarity breeds contempt, however, and for all the movie's pleasant, diversionary tactics, there's no skirting around the big picture: This is a wholly by-the-books affair, one that proceeds strictly from A to B without taking a side trip to some foreign letter. The movie asks the simple questions and offers the simple answers, and all in an achingly simple way. Is Crowe's character a boorish, money-hungry hound when the movie begins? Well, he obviously mistakes material possessions for the presence of a real life. And how do you knock him out of this funk? Have him inherit a French estate/winery, where he falls in love with a local girl and learns to appreciate the finer things in life. No matter that the key to Crowe's happiness is a $7 million villa and a beautiful French goddess, when the most that we probably could hope for is a time share in Myrtle Beach and someone who just got off her shift at the Waffle House. The key is obviously to find the beauty in whatever surroundings you fall into, or something like that. Crowe just had the benefit of a Hollywood screenwriter looking to get paid. Sure, that makes the movie utterly inaccessible and pointless, but hey, if they translated the setting somewhere else, the cast and crew couldn't have spent three months sipping wine in the French countryside. And really, can you blame them? Who knows, maybe if this came from someone other than Scott, one might be a little forgiving. But the old lion has been making movies for the better part of 30 years, and here, he's just calling in sick. That isn't to say that even the great directors can't kick up their feet and take it easy once in a while. Heaven knows he's earned it with films such as "Alien" and "Gladiator." He's still working for an audience, though, and even if he does feel like making a diversion, at least have the courtesy to make it interesting. Scott is just such a great, versatile director, and to hit him like that is painful. But what else is there to do? He took a bland script and was satisfied with just that. Even its pleasantness eventually becomes grating, as you realize that's all the film aspires to be. It's one thing to be a piece of fluff. It's another thing to be lazy. And this movie with all its noble lessons of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, is ultimately about nothing more than the pursuit of box office dollars. If "Sideways" (to pick a random example) is like an ageless fine wine, "A Good Year" is one of those bulk containers of cheap fermentation that you see hobos drink through a paper bag. A dollar a jug and worth every penny. Contact the Diversions Editor at dive@unc.edu.