THE NEW YORK LIST


Nov. 10, 2006

FUR
The critics hate Fur for its script, which is portentous and absurd by turns. But does this Through the Looking Glass (i.e., fantasized) treatment of Diane Arbus’ artistic awakening, starring Nicole Kidman, have anything to recommend it to the art world? Well, Diane’s annoying upstairs neighbor, a former sideshow freak covered with hair like a Wookie, invites her to give him a total shave, which she does -- and he turns out to be a rather worse-for-wear Robert Downey Jr. Yikes! Paging the beast in Jean Cocteau’s 1946 Belle et la Bête, who transformed quite magically, without all that shaving, thank you very much, into the breathtakingly handsome Jean Marais.

...more