Director: Bob Marshall

Poster

Cast: Daniel Day-Lewis/Marion Cotillard/Penélope Cruz/Judi Dench/Stacy Ferguson/Kate Hudson /Nicole Kidman/ Sophia Loren

“They are the only movies telling the truth about the modern world: the death of religion and sexual revolution” the most memorable line from the glossiest film of the year of 2009-Nine, which is also considered with the best cast of the year.

“Nine,” from the Broadway musical, is a movie about a famous director’s creative blockage and sexual confusion, but not quite in the way it wants to be. Straining to capture artistic frenzy, it descends into vulgar chaos, less a homage to Federico Fellini’s “8 ½” (its putative inspiration) than a travesty.
“I can’t make this movie,” the director sings. It seems that he is busily doing everything but making a movie. Escaping from the news conference, dating with his mistress, and keeping falling into nostalgia. The only hope to save him from such messy situation lies in his wife.  His name is Guido, and while his co-workers and admirers call him Maestro, his mastery is purely notional. He made some great films in the past, apparently, but now, in Rome in the mid-1960s, he finds himself in a professional and personal ebb just as his new project, the vague-sounding epic “Italia,” is about to commence shooting.

Gorgeous Scenes

“My husband makes movies,” sings Marion Cotillard, with upswept Audrey Hepburn hair and an air of resignation. She was once mistaken Guido’s behaviors on the casting day was especial for her. And when he asks the heat-broken wife for help, her sympathy and love push her to the fickle husband. But again and again, he breaks her heart consciously or unconsciously. And finally, she left him and get together with another man happily.
None of the rest of Guido’s ladies are so lucky. It must be said that “Nine” is an impressive feat of casting, with a shocking number of Oscar winners and nominees assembled in the service of its dubious and incoherent cause. Judi Dench is Guido’s costume designer and confidante. Penélope Cruz is his super-seductive mistress, Carla, a married woman with serious mascara issues. Nicole Kidman is a Nordic actress meant to conjure memories of Anita Ekberg, though sadly she does not walk around with a kitten on her head. Sophia Loren is Guido’s Mamma, and Kate Hudson is a Vogue reporter who flings herself in his direction.