ALLEN HELPS MAKE YES WORTHWHILE
By JOHN WIRT
jwirt@theadvocate.com
Entertainment writer

The Advocate, LA
Aug 26 2005

Yes

PLAY OFFICIAL TRAILER
Starring: Joan Allen, Simon Abkarian, Sam Neill, Shirley Henderson,
Sheila Hancock and Samantha Bond Crew: Director, Sally Potter;
screenplay, Sally Potter director of photography, Alexi Rodionov;
production designer, Carlos Conti. Siegen Village 10. (Running time:
1 hr., 40 mins.) MPAA Rating: R

Critic’s Rating: out of 4 stars. Have you seen Yes? If so, what do
you think? Was it…
Excellent
Good Fair Bad

Joan Allen, the best actress in movies these days, portrays the
troubled leading lady of Yes. In this intimate, impressionistic drama,
Allen’s renowned American biologist feels trapped in a loveless
marriage to a British politician played by Sam Neil. This London
couple is married in name only.

When Allen and Neil attend a luxurious dinner party one evening —
probably for the sake of her husband’s image — she’s obviously
miserable. But then, from a distance, Allen makes eye contact with
the chef who prepared the meal. He’s a striking man with a sloping
mustache and dark mop of hair. Simon Abkarian, an Armenian actor
based in Paris, plays the cook whose name is never revealed.

The cook wastes no time in revealing his feelings. “I’d like to steal
you from the man who cannot see you are a queen,” he tells Allen. She
gives the romantic stranger her number.

Yes, written and directed by Sally Potter (The Man Who Cried,
Orlando and The Tango Lesson), defies convention. The characters’
spoken words and unspoken thoughts, which are heard in voiceover,
intermingle. Even more unconventional, the film’s characters speak
in verse. The chronology of the events, too, is not strictly linear
and the film’s visual style further distorts and condenses time.

Despite the innovative look and sound, Yes is a simple love story,
albeit complicated by current affairs. The chef is a displaced Arab
from Lebanon. His passion for Allen is such that the political and
cultural gulf between the Muslin and Western worlds is swept away,
at least temporarily.

In the purest sense of the phrase, Yes is art-house cinema. It will
probably confound anyone who prides himself on being Mr. Average
Moviegoer. But for the more artistically inclined, for poetry readers,
cinema students, Yes may well be a rare and rewarding experience. And
just about any film with the great Joan Allen is worth the time and
money. If Hollywood was interested in making great movies, she’d
never be off the screen.