Vita & Virginia

I found the screenplay wonderful; especially how it used the actual letters between Vita and Virginia. The direction, lighting, soundtrack and setting were all spot on. Elizabeth Debicki was utterly brilliant and deserved all of the praise she received. As someone who has read and studied about Virginia for decades, I believe her portrayal is probably the best ever. My rating for this movie would have been a 4.5 but for Gemma Arterton, who was totally and completely and devastatingly wrong for Vita. She's a good actress but she simply doesn't have the intelligence, pure aristocratic entitlement, butch sensuality or even the height, to be able to pull off such a dynamic woman who was Vita Sackville-West. She should have known that immediately. This was made all the more laughable by her crazy siliconed lips she sported throughout the film. It made the last tragic break up scene, where you see those enlarged lips in profile, incredibility funny i/o of moving. I hope this screen play gets another chance one day before I die. It's truly worth if if cast right for BOTH women.

Virginia Woolf's rather scandalous personal life was a harbinger of today's obsessions with identity, sexuality, power, class, artifice and honesty. The script, based largely on her intimate communications with her lover, has an immediacy, poignancy, and intelligence almost entirely lacking in today's film. Absorbing and emotionally powerful. No superheroes or explosions--adult entertainment.

I gave this movie 3 stars mainly for Elizabeth Debicki's portrayal of Virginia, which was illuminating, the cinematography, the incorporation of the letters (which were brilliant) and the Bloomsbury cast who were perfect. The absolute biggest disappointment was the casting of Gemma Arterton as Vita. I'm sure she is a competent actor but casting such a feminine, demur actor to portray Lady Vita Sackville-West is like casting Woody Allen to play Cary Grant. It could never work in a serious biopic. This casting was acerbated by the height difference between Arterton and Debicki; a difference that in reality did not exist. Vita's height is extremely important to the power and presence she had. The fact that this was the 1920s Vita - when according to Leonard she was at the peak of her virility and power - makes it even more horrible that they cast Arterton. Arterton's comical, silicone lips do not help and are testimony to the herculean acting skills that Debicki must possess to pull off such serious acting in their presence. It gets worse as the movie progresses as Arterton's Vita comes across merely as a bored, spoiled, suburban housewife who has a side hobby in writing. Lady Virginia Sackville-West belonged to one of the oldest noble families in Great Britain and all of the entitlement, power, poise that goes with that never appears in this film. Arterton's VIta is so passive that it makes the film's one sex scene seem totally implausible. At the end of the film one is left wondering how on Earth a genius, even one so brilliantly portrayed, could fall for this Vita. Again - just heartbreaking because this film would have been so good if not just for one disastrous casting error.

It was...strange. The choice of soundtrack being the weirdest thing, which I understand was supposed to add a certain effect but to me it just didn't fit at all. Elizabeth Debicki played Virginia perfectly but Gemma Arteton's portrayal of Vita just irritated me.

Beautiful and heartbreaking back story of Orlando.

Breathtakingly intectual and sorrowful. Really captures the helplessness one feels when they fall in love. And Debicki's portrayal of Virginia Woolf is awe-inspiring.

The story of the movie is not interesting

Very much liked it. Literary, pretty and gay.

Needs more context & more realism

I feel a lot of people who found this film 'boring' or are giving it negative reviews didn't really understand it. This is a film made by women for women. There are so few good films about queer women, especially bisexual polyamorous women, this was just the kind of film we needed following the success of films like Carol. It was beautifully shot, wonderfully acted, and really just a compelling representation of Vita Sackville-West's and Virginia Woolf's relationship. I think some people might think the monologues an odd choice, but the film was adapted from a play, which was adapted from the letters between these women, so it was a very conscious decision. If you love Virginia Woolf and/or if you are a queer woman, ignore the negative reviews. This film does not need to be validated by the heteropatriarchal norms upheld by the film industry. This is our film.