Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool

 Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool 2017

• Director: Paul MacGuigan
• Seen by this director: Victor Frankenstein, Sherlock
• Based on the memoirs of Peter Turner
• Cast: Annette Bening, Jamie Bell, Julie Walters, Kenneth Cranham, Vanessa Redgrave, Frances Barber
• Personal “oh yeah him/her” reaction, i.e. have seen this actor in:
• Annette Bening – Ginger and Rosa, The Kids Are All Right, Being Julia, American Beauty, Mars Attacks!, Richard III, The Grifters
• Jamie Bell – Rocketman, Skin, Fantastic Four, Filth, Jane Eyre, The Eagle, Defiance, Jumper, Hallam Foe, King Kong, Dear Wendy, Undertow, Billy Elliot
• Julie Walters – Mamma Mia 1&2, Secret Garden, Before You Go, The Hollow Crown Henry IV Parts One and Two, Henry V, Harry Potter 1-8, Becoming Jane, Driving Lessons, Wah-Wah, Calendar Girls, Billy Elliot, Titanic Tow, Intimate Relations, Prick Up Your Ears, Educating Rita
• Kenneth Cranham – Made in Dagenham, Valkyria, Merlin, Hot Fuzz, A Good Year, Hustle, Born Romantic, Our Mutual Friend, RPM, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
• Vanessa Redgrave - The Butler, A Song for Marion, Coriolanus, Atonement, Girl Interrupted, Wilde, Smilla’s Sense of Snow, Playing for Time, Out of Season, The Devils, Howards End, The Ballad of Sad Café, Prick Up Your Ears, O What a Lovely War, Isadora, Camelot, Blow-Up
• Frances Barber - The Bookshop, Vicious, Doctor Who, Friday Night Dinner, Hustle, Still Crazy, Twelfth Night, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid
• Why?  Jamie Bell, Julie Walters, the title
• Seen:  5 February 2022 

In 1979 the young British actor Peter Turner (Bell) and the legendary American actor Gloria Grahame begin a tumultuous love affair in Liverpool. Two years later she returns to Liverpool and Peter and his parents (Walters and Cranham), dying of cancer.

Flashbacks alternate with scenes of her illness and the care given by the Turners. It’s very emotional.

We have recently seen a couple of films with Grahame. She was wonderful as Ado Annie in Oklahoma. I didn’t know this film was about her when I bought it. I’m so glad I did. Both Bening and Bell should have been given Oscars for this. 

4 ½ * of 5