Opening with the dulcet tones of Sir Ian McKellen wrapped around a sky full of stars, Stardust poses a philosophical query about whether the urge to gaze up at the heavens is what makes us fully human. It's just the movie's way of letting us know what we're getting into, that this is a fairy tale with more than meets the eye — although what meets the eye is perfectly swell, too, thank you very much.
Stardust is that rare bird that makes the most of having its cake and eating it too, a sometimes hugely appealing concoction that honors the spirit and traditions of fairy tales and fantasy while putting a clever, gently ironic spin on everything it touches. Some might be tempted to call the movie's approach a little calculated: too Shrek postmodern-lite by way of The Princess Bride (with a touch of Gilliam's Baron Munchausen thrown in for good measure) — but even if Stardust doesn't quite achieve the same heights as its prototypes, the air up there is often pretty exhilarating.
The starting point here is an imaginary English village called Wall, appropriately enough, in that it's surrounded by a huge, ancient barrier separating it from a place curious enough to give Harry Potter pause. What lies beyond the wall of Wall is the magical realm of Stormhold, an anything-goes kingdom where the colorful locals think nothing of shape-shifting magi or elephants the size of housecats or jars filled with human eyeballs that, when in the mood, stare right back at you.
Into this spirited phantasmagoria comes Tristan (Charlie Cox), a seemingly ordinary Wallite who, unbeknownst to all but a select few, is actually a hybrid hero-in-the-making, the product of a long-ago tryst between a mortal father and a magical princess. Every fairy tale needs a quest, and Tristan's begins humbly enough, as he sets out to locate a fragment from a recently fallen shooting star (a gift for a pretty but shallow would-be girlfriend played by Sienna Miller) and winds up with significantly more than he bargained for.
The star turns out to be an ethereal but outwardly human-looking entity named Yvaine (Claire Danes), who also appears to be in possession of a magical pendant that will determine who'll be the new king of Stormhold. This leads to all sorts of flamboyantly unsavory types zipping about in hot pursuit of the beautiful starchild, including an ancient and deliciously wicked witch (Michelle Pfeiffer), for whom Yvaine's death means eternal youth. The hearts of stars apparently possess extremely desirable properties for centuries-old witches, working like some sort of Super-Botox on the withered crones lucky enough to gobble them up and immediately transform into the air-brushed spitting image of, well, Michelle Pfeiffer.
Close scrutiny of the movie's logic or metaphysics or its somewhat dicey plot convolutions will only lead to heartbreak, so don't even think about going there. In any event, none of these things matter much, nor do they diminish the pleasures, mostly simple but some fairly spectacular, of Stardust.
Things start off a bit herky-jerky, but the movie's forward momentum eventually takes on a life of its own, as Tristan and Yvaine leap from frying pan to fire, out of witches' cauldrons and straight into a pirate ship capturing lightning in its nets as it sails through the clouds. From there it's one damn thing after another (and I use this term with the greatest affection), right up to the point where Tristan acquires an Orlando Bloom-ish glint in the eye and assumes his rightful, regal position in the world, with the help of some motherly advice from a gay pirate father-figure. Fireworks ensue, love finds a way, and the movie sends us out of the theater with a crescendo of digital mayhem and one final Happily Ever After.
Based on a series of popular graphic novels by Neil Gaiman, Stardust makes for a satisfying change of pace from Matthew Vaughn, a director previously best known for the gritty gangster opus Layer Cake and for being best man at Guy Ritchie's wedding to Madonna (a gig that comes with the territory, being Ritchie's longtime producer). The flying pirates, gibbering ghosts and despotic witches of Stardust are obviously far removed from the contemporary British underworld typically associated with Vaughan-Ritchie projects, but some of the knowing nastiness from those films has insinuated itself quite comfortably into the Once-Upon-a-Time heart beating here. For all its upbeat charm, Stardust is sprinkled with surprisingly droll and even macabre humor, from off-screen dissections played for laughs to a Greek chorus of gruesome specters popping up every so often to supply some American Werewolf in London-styled yuks.
Vaughn and Ritchie have always filled their films with engaging actors — Layer Cake featured what might be the defining pre-007 performance by Daniel Craig — and Stardust is no exception. Danes is just awkward enough to be immensely appealing here (she's turning into Hollywood's coolest big-boned blonde since Uma Thurman), Pfeiffer is perfectly cast as an aging ice queen desperate to hang on to her beauty, and, just when your attention might be about to flag, in marches Robert De Niro, chewing up the scenery as a big, bad pirate screaming to unleash his inner queen. Add a couple of amiable cameos by Ricky Gervais and Peter O'Toole (blink and you'll miss him, but, after Ratatouille, it's O'Toole's second best role of the decade), and you've got one of the more entertaining on-screen ensembles in ages.
Maybe it's just that we're deep into a summer of mostly dismal or disappointing wannabe-blockbusters, but Stardust feels a lot like the real deal — a big-budget extravaganza with significantly more brains and class than we've come to expect in our sword-and-sorcery throwdowns. The first battle scene doesn't even materialize until well past the halfway mark, but the movie still generates a bigger rush than the "wall-to-wall action" (read: mindless robot frenzy) of Transformers — besides which, it's the first movie since Blade Runner that manages to maintain its credibility while featuring a unicorn, and that's got to count for something.
This article appears in Aug 8-14, 2007.
