SERENA (2014)

Genre: Drama
Director: Susanne Bier
Cast: Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper, Rhys Ifans, Toby Jones, Sean Harris, Sam Reid
RunTime: 1 hr 50 mins
Rating: M18 (Sexual Scenes)
Released By: Shaw
Official Website: http://www.magpictures.com/serena/

Opening Day: 1 January 2015

Synopsis: The film follows newlyweds George (Cooper) and Serena Pemberton (Lawrence) who travel from Boston to the mountains of North Carolina where they begin to build a timber empire in 1929. Serena soon shows herself to be the equal of any man: overseeing crews, hunting rattle-snakes, even saving a man's life in the wilderness. Together, this king and queen rule their dominion, killing or vanquishing all who stand in the way of their ambitions. But when Serena learns that she can never bear a child, she sets out to murder the son George had before his marriage…

Movie Review:

In between ‘The Silver Linings Playbook’ and ‘American Hustle’, Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence teamed on a Depression-era drama for Danish female director Susanne Bier, a film which has curiously taken three years to be released. The reason for that delay is clear once we saw it – though perfectly well-acted by both Cooper and Lawrence, there is little critical or commercial value to a film which lacks narrative momentum and cannot quite escape the trappings of a romantic melodrama.

Yes, in case it isn’t clear, ‘Serena’ is first and foremost a tragic romance. Adapted by Christopher Kyle (‘Alexander’ and ‘K19: The Widowmaker’) from Ron Rash’s 2008 bestselling novel, it tells of the tumultuous marriage of George Pemberton (Cooper), a smug self-made timber baron struggling to keep his company afloat at the cusp of the economic downturn, and Serena Shaw (Lawrence), a headstrong ambitious woman struggling to deal with her tragic teenage past losing her brothers and sisters to a terrible fire. George is taken at first sight by Serena’s femme fatale, and after a brief ride in the countryside, the two are promptly married to each other.

‘Serena’s’ story really begins after their nuptials, beginning with how she takes a more active role in the running of George’s affairs than what was expected of wives then in the late 1920s. Not only does she insist on supervising the loggers personally, she even takes it upon herself to import an eagle for a pet to get rid of the ‘snake’ problem that has bitten many a worker. Her formidable hands-on approach rubs George’s right-hand-man Buchanan (David Dencik) the wrong way, and while the script also hints at a homosexual attraction that he has for George, that possibility is never quite really developed – in turn, Buchanan strikes a deal with the sheriff (Toby Jones) of Waynesville to expose George’s corrupt business practices which he was also complicit to.

Without revealing any spoilers, Serena urges George to take care of business, the first hint of how far she is willing to go to protect her own personal interests. That is also why she regards George’s former flame Rachel (Ana Ularu) with contempt, and while she tolerates Rachel’s presence as well as that of her son whom George fathered illegitimately, that quickly changes when a tragic misfortune midway into the film plunges her into depression and takes its toll on her marriage with George too. There is no happy ending for any character here, not even something bittersweet, but that isn’t the reason why Kyle’s script and/or Bier’s direction left us wanting.

The only way ‘Serena’s’ melodramatic story could have worked was for its audience to be invested in the main couple; alas, Kyle tries – but fails to grasp – a character-driven narrative for George or Serena, so much so that the latter’s misfortune and subsequent descent into mental anguish left us aloof. Kyle’s metaphor of George’s search for an elusive panther up in the mountains also comes across heavy-handed and never quite registers with the same poignancy as he obviously intended to. So is his definition of Rhys Ifans’ taciturn but superstitious Appalachian woodsman named Galloway, whose bond with Serena after an accident in which she saves his life isn’t quite fleshed out. Of course, the fault is also Bier’s, who seems almost tone-deaf to the dramatic beats of the material.

At least for those piqued by the re-teaming of Cooper and Lawrence, the chemistry between the golden screen couple doesn’t disappoint. Lawrence is fiery intense as the titular character, and Cooper is a nice counterbalance underplaying his role with restraint and nuance. There is more depth and texture to their acting than their tragic romance deserves, and one quite wishes a better script and certainly a more suitable director could have made this the gripping character study it was meant to be.

Like we said at the beginning, were it not for Cooper and Lawrence, ‘Serena’ would probably not see the light of day in a cinema. Instead, it rides solely on the coattails of its leading stars’ popularity, and while it certainly isn’t boring, it never gets involving or engaging enough, literally leaving its audience in the cold. Dismiss this as third time unlucky for the couple, and wait for the next David O’ Russell team-up to watch them rekindle their onscreen chemistry.

Movie Rating:

(Not even the chemistry of Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence can save this plodding romantic melodrama from its own boredom)

Review by Gabriel Chong