Kitsch and dull

Actually, it's not: it's all about artifice. Director Thomas Vinterberg has said that he wanted to make a film as far as possible from his last, the terrific Festen. So instead of rigorous naturalism we get a futuristic escape fantasy, and instead of a startling, powerful story we get diluted nonsense about love and apocalypse.

John (Joaquin Phoenix, pictured) comes to New York to serve his estranged wife, ice-skating star Elena (Claire Danes), with divorce papers. Once there, he realises that he's still in love - and that she's in big trouble. Phoenix said there was more green screen (blank background, filled in later by computer) in this than in any other of his films, including Gladiator, and he and Danes appear to be acting in a blank space - not helped by the Polish accents Vinterberg has foisted on them.

There are a couple of nice ideas but mostly this experiment in unreality feels kitsch and excruciatingly dull. And any director who gets Sean Penn then sticks him in an eternally airborne plane with nothing to do but mutter nonsense deserves to have their budget confiscated.