Word: swinton
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Director and writer Sally Potter stretches the limits of the camera and the lead actress, Tilda Swinton, to make a movie enjoyable to people who like to laugh with joy as well as those who are just along for the visual ride...
...story is a trip through time by Orlando, exquisitely played by Swinton. Starting in 1600 with the subject Death, Orlando experiences 'Love,' 'Poetry,' 'Politics', 'Sex' and 'Birth' in front of our eyes. Orlando falls in love with a Muscovite, sees an early Shakespeare production, travels to the mysterious East, begins to write poetry and hobnobs with some of the more famous writers of the past...
Orlando is not without secrets, however. Although played by a woman, the character begins as a man accompanied by clever narration meant to create a suspension of disbelief. Though a glance is enough to see through this, as the story progresses it gets easier and easier to see Swinton as a man. Just when this happens, however, Orlando wakes up one morning to discover that he has become a woman. Addressing the audience, Orlando explains things by simply saying, "Just a different sex, nothing else changed...
...Queen Elizabeth (Quentin Crisp) deeds a great English manor to handsome young Lord Orlando (Tilda Swinton) on one condition: "Do not fade, do not wither, do not grow old." The lad takes the monarch's admonition to heart and, miraculously, ages not at all from that day to this. Orlando is a fellow in love with love -- ever eager to die upon a kiss, but destined to live forever apart from those mortals he cherishes. In 1610 he falls for a fickle Russian princess (Charlotte Valandrey). One day, a century and a half later, he wakes...
...canvas, the immediacy of its emotions, the palliative power of its wit. They can swim in its gorgeous images: the fruit seen below a sheath of ice, the oars dipping into dark water, the fearful maiden rushing between high hedges and across battlefields. They surely believe in Swinton as the pearl and perfection of any gender; her poise and gravity, and the drama of her pale face under a crown of red hair, could mark her as this generation's russet Redgrave. Orlando proves anything is possible in movies if artists can make it plausible...