JohnLeeT One can not help but be overwhelmed by the power, the stunning brilliance, and incredibly amazing performance by Ms. Emily Watson that assuredly deserved an Academy Award and which shames the Oscars forever because a Paltrow, Berry, or other flunky has received a statue and Watson has been brutally robbed. This is acting at its absolute finest and a role so perfectly realized by Watson that it can never be forgotten by anyone who has seen it. Never in the history of cinema has any actress so completely captured the very soul of a character and transferred it so expertly to film. It is indeed a film for the ages because of what Watson brings to it, the fire and passion she ignites the screen with, and the unbridled superbness of craft she puts forth. One is almost blinded by such brilliance and I was not the only member of the audience to stagger from the theatre upon first viewing of this film, breathless with astonishment and trembling with emotion as I tried to find words to express the depth of my feelings to my evening's companion. I could barely speak the word "Emily" and could see from my companion's eyes she was equally affected by what she had just witnessed and we shared the awe in silence as the dazed audience around us wandered as if numbed into the night. Rarely has a performance touched me in this way and yet with Emily Watson it is par for the course due to an unequaled talent that few if any other actor can begin to approach. I felt pummeled by her work, bruised by her electric might, and singed by her passion. That night was one I will never forget. I have never seen an audience literally struck dumb by a performance in a cinema. Since seeing this film I have found Watson routinely splendid and spectacularly superb in role after role. There is no doubt she is the single greatest living actor working in the English language today and this film serves as a perfect showcase for her magnificent genius.

Framescourer Jacqueline de Pre was an exceptional cellist. I know this because I've heard her recordings. This film, in classic biopic fashion, looks to take material detailing another side of her life - specifically a book by her siblings - and turn that into a film that illuminates, humanises or sensationalises her life with, it must be assumed, the best of intentions.Hilary and Jackie takes a view of Jacquline du Pre that makes her out to be perversely, belligerently needy. This may be true of course but I do not feel that Anand Tucker's film cross-refers this part of her life with the music making. Instead we get a picture of a argumentative, pitiful, blinkeredly adulterous woman almost free of context, culminating in a dramatisation of her later stages of MS.I think that Emily Watson does and admirable job and is more than matched by Rachel Griffiths as her loving and long-suffering sister. This is just a rather narrow-minded movie that really does suggest it's very difficult to make a biopic about musicians, whose achievements consistently defy re-appropriating in cinema. 4/10

being-in-itself Note: The following is a condensed version of my Amazon.com review, to fit the word limit:In terms of raw ability and potential, Jacqueline du Pré was arguably the greatest cello talent in modern history. At her height in the 1960s, concerts with her and Barenboim would make the world forget (for a while) Rostropovich and Casals. For listeners of classical music who kept up with her releases and watched her performances, she seemed to be an embodiment of talent -- dynamic, joyous, ethereally gifted, tragically cut short by multiple sclerosis. To those of us who kept Jacqueline's recordings in our psyches, her death was agonizing particularly for the sense of loss -- for what *could have been* (the breadth of her repertoire having been severely limited by MS).This loathsome and abominable film, based on the controversial memoir by du Pré's siblings ("A Genius in the Family"), viciously insults and debases Jacqueline's memory. The errors of omission and commission are too many to name here, but the portrayal of Jacqueline in this film has been condemned by her friends and colleagues (including Rostropovich) as a vicious travesty of her character. Everything about this movie is -- as a previous reviewer stated -- iniquitous, gross and vulgar. Nothing here reminds one of the sensitive, joyous, brilliant musician that is seen in video reels and recalled by her acquaintances. Instead, the depiction is based on an exclusive (but loose) focus on a very dubious memoir, focusing on the gratuitous and doubtful details of her sex life and relationship with her sister, Hilary (who obviously has a chip on her shoulder and happens to be the author of the memoir upon which this is based). Clare Finzi, Hilary's daughter, wrote and contested the film account of events as a "gross misinterpretation, which I cannot let go unchallenged".To add insult to injury, the director doesn't even care about accuracy, stating that "it (truth) doesn't exist" due to divergent viewpoints. (One wonders what he would have made of Holocaust denial.) It's the height of hubris and irresponsibility to popularize sensationalist claims against a person's character without any concern for truth or respect for their memory. A New York Times critic posed the question of whether the film was a "travesty or painful truth", which is not the primary issue at all. W. K. Clifford famously said that if we cannot ascertain the grounds for a belief, we have no business in believing it. I would add that we have even less business in popularizing heterodox and unsubstantiated beliefs to a mass audience -- qualifying this posthumous attack on Jacqueline du Pré's character as a vicious and appalling act.Taken at face value then, this film is worthless, totally worthless. The response may be that biopics have no obligations to factual accuracy -- that this is the exclusive province of documentaries or books. But a film can be both fictional and offensive (for e.g. denying the Holocaust or defaming war veterans). Those who admired Jacqueline du Pré and studied her life and work do not take this film seriously as fact. Nevertheless they will watch it with a sinking feeling, until they can't bear to have their recollections maimed any further by emetic (and completely fictional) scenes that have nothing to do with the cellist they adored. There were several times during the viewing in which I literally wanted to gouge my eyes out -- but even if I did so, the scenes would stay in my mind forever.Then there are those who -- noting this -- will still enjoy the movie. In that case they don't care anything for the real-life Jacqueline du Pré at all (and probably wouldn't have even if they didn't see this movie, so that's no loss). But others would do better to peruse the biographies of her by Carol Easton, Elizabeth Wilson and, yes, the du Pré siblings (if you read between the lines). Or better yet, listen to her music and watch the documentaries of her which contain clips of her life and performances. These were directed by Christopher Nupen who, unlike Tucker, actually knew and cared about his subject matter.Good biopics are done with a serious respect for the subject's memory, concern for truth, and historical substantiation. _Pollock_ is one of them, _My Left Foot_ is another. This one isn't. It would have made a decent _Forrest Gump_ or _Good Will Hunting_, if the director had the integrity to use fictional names and locations. Why on earth did they not just leave it at that and left Jacqueline du Pré's memory in peace? She did nothing to deserve such defacement, nothing at all.

bob the moo As a child Hilary was the talented musician on the flute and the younger Jacqueline was encouraged to keep up if she wanted to accompany her sister on trips to musical events. So Jackie practiced hard on her cello to do so, gradually becoming better than her sister. As adults Hilary is now very much in the shadow of her brilliant sister Jackie, who is booked solid for shows. However where Hilary finds happiness and support from her partner and husband Kiffer, Jackie grows increasingly isolated from others. The pair's relationship drifts apart but comes together again to produce one traumatic moment in their relationship.I'm sure it has been done many times but I still found this film's structure to be pretty clever. The central traumatic act in the narrative occurs halfway through the film; up until then we follow things from Hilary's point of view and then in the second half we jump backwards and work up to it again (and beyond) from Jacqueline's (more or less). The effect is that the first half of the film is engaging as it develops along lines we don't know while the second film is engaging as it underpins the reasons for Jacqueline's character and where she goes from there. I put of watching the film because I had no knowledge of the characters and no real interest in their music, however now that I have watched it I am glad I did as it is well made and interesting. It is very character driven and evenly paced, which will annoy some viewers but for me it worked really well and produced a story that didn't require you to know the people involved because you felt you did by the end.Watson leads the cast really well, bringing out the innocent of her character as easily as she does the spite within Jackie. Griffiths yet again shows her talent in taking on yet another accent and strange character and pulling it off. They work well together although their best scenes are early on. Support is good from Frain, Morrissey, Dance, Imrie and others but the film is lead well by the main two actresses who work well with the material given them.Overall this is a well paced film that will annoy some but is heavy in quality. The character development in the script is strong and the cast respond well to it. Tucker controls it all well with a good eye for a scene and some imaginative visual touches and brings out a film that is well-structured and engaging even if it won't be to everyone's tastes.