Boogie Woogie

an exposé of the london art world and the corrupt, pretentious people who run it, boogie woogie submits some good actors-gillian anderson, alan cumming, stellan skarsgard, amanda seyfried-to some outrageous posturing. open-mouthed laughter.

lots of "darling!" intonations. all this against a background of damien hirst pieces and-unfortunately-hirst's grisly sense of the human condition. hirst himself curated some of the art on view, including enlarged paintings of microscopic germs and a glass-encased tumor.

director duncan ward laggardly paces danny moynihan's script. this doesn't help what might well be an accurate portrayal of bourgeois decadence-especially when ward is given to lecherous emphasis while emphasizing his characters' lechery. centered around attempts to buy piet mondrian's "broadway boogie woogie" from a dying owner (christopher lee exclaiming: "i got it from the master himself!"), the movie attempts the examination of a scene like robert altman achieved in prêt-à-porter.

but whereas altman transcended cynicism, ward lacks all of mondrian's beauty: the impressive lines of "broadway boogie woogie"-its structure, openness and sense of space-have the moral order and energy this movie lacks.

-- boogie woogie directed by duncan ward at the ifc center runtime: 94 min.