It's hard to talk about \Femme Fatale"" without using the phrase ""style over substance."" The film is packed with style and smart directing, but it's ultimately forgettable and at times uninteresting, qualities rarely associated with director Brian De Palma's films.
""Femme Fatale"" starts off by introducing the audience to Laure Ash (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos), a seductive thief from Paris whose sole purpose in a heist is to make love with a model dressed in jewels so that her cohorts can switch them with phonies while the two women engage in soft-core pornography worthy of Cinemax. Through a series of semi-suspenseful yet at times all too coincidental events, Laure betrays her fellow thieves, flees with the diamonds, ends up being mistaken for a young woman who has just lost her husband and son, escapes to America and marries a future ambassador who will eventually force her return to France and hide from her former associates. If all this sounds somewhat disjointed and far fetched, it is because it is. The audience is never really given any real information on Laure's character except that she is one of the most selfish characters ever written for the screen.
Jump ahead to seven years later where Laure must now evade her former underworld associates while living as the dignified wife of an ambassador. It is at this point that the audience is introduced to Nicolas Bardo (Antonio Banderas), a freelance paparazzi who seems like he was written into the script on a last minute whim to serve as a catalyst for Laure's selfishness and a reason for some more soft-core porn. The plot becomes truly bizarre from this point on, handing the audience a twist that makes them question what just happened for the last hour and 45 minutes. Maybe if the characters had been more likeable or well developed it would have worked. Not so.
The movie isn't a total failure though. De Palma always brings something interesting to the table, and ""Femme Fatale"" is full of interesting editing and split screen techniques that keeps the audience somewhat entertained. Any suspense or general satisfaction from the picture is to De Palma's credit as a craftsman, and he separates the film's look and feel from other typical thrillers. Still, in the end it isn't enough to make ""Femme Fatale"" recommendable. The film is more concerned with trickery and style than with the characters, and it ultimately suffers for it. The only way this film is truly worthwhile is if you're a huge fan of De Palma, or if you're interested in two hours of Romijn-Stamos in many different scantily clad outfits.
The last time most people saw Jerry Seinfeld, he was performing in his long-running stand-up routine on HBO in ""I'm Telling You For The Last Time."" It's been two years since that final performance and in the interim Seinfeld has been off the radar. While his co-stars have all failed at returning to the sitcom arena, Seinfeld himself has continued his relatively private demeanor. ""Comedian"" documents his return to his stand-up roots over the past year. In the process, ""Comedian"" digs one level deeper than the press has ever gotten to Seinfeld, finally revealing a bit about what makes the comedian tick.
The film, digitally shot by Christian Charles, does not delve so much into how Seinfeld is funny but why he feels compelled to be funny. Seinfeld himself describes the process of developing a routine in tiny, smoke-filled nightclubs as about as embarrassing as ""going to work in your underwear."" He had one of the most successful sitcoms in television history, and he's once again in the trenches of comedy for no understandable reason. Jay Leno, Garry Shandling and Chris Rock all appear in backstage talks with Seinfeld; through these chats, we start to see that the most successful comics share an almost obsessive compulsion to make people laugh. This compulsion is the only reason possible for Seinfeld to be out on the road, crafting a new routine from scratch.
Charles tries to counterpoint Seinfeld with young comic Orny Adams, a mild-talented newcomer to the scene. This counterpoint fails to keep the audience's attention, mostly because Adams is not particularly talented or captivating. However, he does serve to illustrate another comic that is obsessed with perfection. When we return to Seinfeld, we quickly realize that none are more obsessed with perfection than Seinfeld himself.
""Comedian"" will likely only appeal to fans of stand-up comedy or ""Seinfeld."" Rightly so, as the subject matter is likely to bore someone who has no interest. However, ""Comedian"" does do an excellent job of shedding some light on those who make us laugh and, more importantly, the massive effort it takes to garner those laughs in the first place.
