Review: Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool

"She was a big name in black-and-white films, not so much in colour," says one character of Gloria Grahame in Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool, adapted from actor and writer Peter Turner's memoir of his time with the Oscar-winning actress.

Indeed, by the time the 28-year-old Turner met Grahame, she was twice his age and well past her prime. An iconic femme fatale figure in films such as In a Lonely Place, directed by her then-husband Nicholas Ray, and Human Desire and The Big Heat, both helmed by Fritz Lang. The arrival of Technicolor exacerbated her obsession with her looks - Grahame not only had several cosmetic surgeries but was known to stuff cotton or tissue between her lip and teeth to achieve her signature sultry pout - and her reputation for being increasingly difficult to work with, along with her scandalous personal life (her fourth husband was Anthony Ray, her former stepson; it was rumoured that Nicholas Ray had discovered Grahame in bed with his son, who was then thirteen) contributed to her waning popularity.

For Turner, Grahame was the flirty older woman next door who used to be a star but was now trying to get herself back in the game by treading the boards in England. The film moves back and forth between 1979 and 1981, juxtaposing the steamy passion of their incipient romance with the more melancholy later stages when an ailing Grahame asks Turner to let her spend her final days in Liverpool being cared for by his family, specifically his mother Bella (Julie Walters). Director Paul McGuigan pulls off clever transitional scenes with the help of cinematographer Urszula Pontikos and editor Nick Emerson, utilising long hallways and open doors to slip from present to past and back again. There's a deliberate superficiality to the proceedings, as if the whole film was a literal projection of Turner's memories, one that he could rewind and fast-forward at will.

Affectionate though this film may be towards its subjects, one never fully grasps who Grahame and Turner are or why and how they were attracted to one another. There's a certain one-dimensionality to the characters that almost makes them stock. That said, Annette Bening as Grahame and Jamie Bell as Turner deliver excellent performances, truly selling the romance as well as embodying their characters' conflicts during that specific period of time. Bell may have the least showy role of the two, but he's tremendously affecting. Bening is nothing less than luminous; in a way, her portrayal is a more vulnerable variation of the minxish tart she played in The Grifters, a role which would have been perfect for Grahame had it been made during her heyday.

Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool

Directed by: Paul McGuigan

Written by: Matt Greenhalgh; based on the memoir by Peter Turner

Starring: Annette Bening, Jamie Bell, Vanessa Redgrave, Julie Walters, Kenneth Cranham, Stephen Graham, Frances Barber, Leanne Best