Review movies: Also on release | Dorian Gray | Oliver Parker | The Importance of Being Earnest | Victorian Gothic splendour | narcissism

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The Review - AT THE MOVIES with DAN CARRIER
Published: 10 September 2009

Also on release this week

DORIAN GRAY
Directed by Oliver Parker. Certificate: 15

DIRECTOR Oliver Parker once adapted Oscar Wilde’s countryside/city farce The Importance of Being Earnest. Now he turns his hand to Wilde’s powerful novel about youth and narcissism, and uses the backdrop of Highgate Cemetery’s Victorian Gothic splendour to tell this story of how an innocent young man becomes essentially obsessed with his own looks and the lust that is triggered by a pact with the devil to stay forever young.
We see Gray’s demise marked by the ageing of a portrait of himself and then watch to see if the love of a woman can lead him out of this pact.
Sadly, strangely, the constant sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll Gray drags after a while. Yet it is a good book for Parker to turn his hand to – this story is as relevant today as when Wilde first penned it, considering our obsessions with youth culture, looks and cosmetic surgery.

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