Like watching a freshly painted Gainesborough painting dry.

This movie is wonderful. Romance IS sexier than graphic sex.

Slow, plodding and lacking narrative. One of Jane Campion's least interesting film. However the two leads are mesmerizing.

This was a complete snoozefest. sure the acting was good, but this is a story that we've seen a hundred times before. what's so fresh or interesting about this? nothing.

Beautiful cinematography and fine acting cannot make up for a painfully slow pace and a narrative that seems only partially realized. Chunks of the story are left unstated, and Campion fails to provide sufficient cues to permit the viewer to fill in the gaps. The result is that watching this movie requires the same sort of patience and commitment and interpretive skill that it takes to understand and appreciate complex (some might say impenetrable) poetry. found this a hard one to sit through.… Expand

Excellent film, very moving.

Beautiful individual scenes -- lots of them -- but otherwise not enjoyable. Difficult to hear dialogue (even poetry). Wait for home DVD so you have subtitles.

Gorgeous movie, well acted, slow, deliberate, but highly romantic. Action fans may not have the patience for it, but I highly recommend this.

Tragically beautiful. Wishaw encapsulates Keats' ethereal nature perfectly. A rare romance that simply impossible to brush off.

Beautiful and lyrical film ... another stunning achievement by Campion. I went home and found my college Oxford Anthology of English Lit and reread "Endymion" and "Ode to a Nightengale". Exquisite.

For the second time in 30 years, I walked out on a movie. When the most entertaining thing is the scenery and the most exciting moment is a rainstorm, you've got yourself one really boring film. (Well, Keats does cough up blood at one point.) No one does anything and nothing happens. Jane Campion has come up with her answer to waterboarding.

What some call restraint I call boring. Absolutely no dramatic tension at all. I LOVE John Keats's poetry, but could not have cared less about Campion's characters. And please: the real story here is Keats and his art, NOT Fanny the Faun.

This was a beautifully shot love story. Abbie Cornish as Fanny was exquisite. Loved the costuming and authenticity of the interiors and exteriors. The pace of the film, however, was excruciatingly slow.

Incandescently beautiful, swooningly romantic, soaringly uplifting, heartbreaking, and pretty much perfect. Along with the "The Hurt Locker" it's the best movie of the year.

Beautifully realized film, so tender and delicate. Both performances are deep and moving. Its subtlety may go over some heads but I found it to be an exceptional film.

Anyone giving this movie less than about an 8 has something other than blood flowing thorough their veins. This movie sets the standard for historical fiction. No detail throws you out of the period. The movie is about a romance, and that's the point. The poetry becomes more important because you come to know the characters involved. I thought the move did a fine job of building tension into a story the outlines of which are well-known. The girl who played Fanny was especially effective, but the cast was uniformly thrilling.… Expand

This film really sneaks up on you. It threatened to be just another costume drama, and then somehow managed to completely transport me with its elegance, fine performances, and delicate touch with the tenderest of love stories. By the end of the film, listening to 'Ode to a Nightingale" read in its entirety, I had a very difficult time composing myself enough to leave the theatre.

Real love, between the star-crossed, shines from Bright Star. We feel the simple, insatiable thirst that love brings, in a thoroughly modern period retelling. And unlike the slew of self-aware biopics of the last decade, here the hitherto unseen Keats speaks, and the love that animated him comes to life again. She warms us even now. A pen!

Well, rats. I have a PhD in 19th-century lit, so I am able to deal with nuance and subtlety and poetry. I couldn't wait to see this film--but I am disappointed in it. It IS like watching a lovely Gainesborough painting dry. Cornish was very good, but Keats seemed like a boring wimp. And they had no chemistry between them. I am surprised at the viewers who say it was so moving and intensely sexy. I just didn't see that. Lovely scenery, etc., but disappointing. I went in wanting to love it. Sigh.… Expand

I don't know if the true life version of this love story was as chaste as this movie makes it seem, but otherwise this film does solid work all around.

It's dry in a PBS sort of way, but it delivers exactly what it promises. And Abbie Cornish was (is) amazingly beautiful and talented.

Beautiful film, loved Abbie Cornish as Fanny. It is so nice to see such an outstanding performance from an actress these days espcially in a time piece. The visual aspects and scenery were stunning.

Disappointing although beautifully rendered. Sort of static. They meet, they love, he dies.

Tepid, boring, and precious. I din't, actually, find the period detail convincing. It was distracting, and many of the scene reminded me of advertisers' idealizations or lifestyle images showing children of different ages all engaging in idyllic pastimes on large green lawns that only the priveleged can access. I also thought that both Cornish and Wishaw were miscast. Wishaw was turnoff and Cornish was stolid. I also couldn't catch a fair amount of the dialogue. An generally overrated film, I would say. I wonder what the UK reviews say.… Collapse

Sorry John V, but anyone who gives this movie more than a 1 knows nothing about Keats' life, his relationship with Fanny, his poetry, film-making in general, and the incredibly inept and pathetic Jane Campion. I should have known better than to see this film, considering I thought "The Piano" over-wrought and pompous. Sad that Campion knows nothing about Keats and yet chose to make a film about him. Those of us who have studied Keats' life and his poetry, and who are familiar with his letters to Fanny (she saved all of them, so why didn't Campion read them), who have written critically/analytically about the poetry, and who have taught Keats' work, either are or should be appalled at this incredibly inaccurate and simple-minded film. A pox on Jane Campion. She needs to go back to school---film-making school as well as a decent undergraduate liberal arts college.… Expand

Elemental and achingly beautiful, this is Jane Campion at her very best. Craft and emotion woven into poetry. Beautifully cast and acted down to the smallest role.

I found the typical meter of the actor's words that resemble any other period peice, that each word is spoken with as much significance as we today attribute to the time, lacked realism and detracted from the making the film anything out of the ordinary. In essense its form was very typical of any other period drama, however I think Abbie Cornish's portrayal was devastatingly glorious. She was the heart-strings of this film and swayed it in whatever way she wished.… Expand