Review – Simone

Or “S1M0NE” if you prefer the studio’s hokey spelling. The premise here isn’t anything to write home about: a down-on-his-luck director of crappy art flicks can’t get any living actresses to appear in his movies, so through the beneficence of a dying computer genius he inherits a virtual star who becomes an overnight sensation. The high jinks that result aren’t exactly the height of hilarity. Whatever chance the story might otherwise have had is swiftly done in by the ham-handed direction and the sorry excuse for a script. However, the acting’s the real death of this flick. The newcomer they got to play the beloved-by-everyone digital babe is a real meat puppet, and whatever they expected to get out of Al Pacino in the Pygmalion role didn’t end up delivered. Lay that one squarely at Pacino’s doorstep; he almost literally stumbles through the whole production, appearing as if he constantly had to be heavily sedated to even get him on to the set of this barking dog. See if desperate