*½/****
starring Pernilla August, Helena Bergström, Lena Endre, Olsson-Frigårdh
written and directed by Colin Nutley
by Walter Chaw Colin Nutley's insufferable (and interminable) in-joke of a roundelay concerning nine aging Swedish actresses each vying for the coveted role of Queen Christina in a remake of the Garbo classic suffers from that peculiar malady of actors occasionally thinking it novel to pretend that their lives are as laden with the indignities of outrageous fortune as ours. While one wonders if the auto-fun-poking would be more trenchant were one more familiar with the reputations and peccadilloes of the actors in question (among them Pernilla August, Lena Endre, and Nutley's wife, Helena Bergstrom), the quintessential truth is that this sort of thing is never particularly interesting (see also: America's Sweethearts). Stretched well past the breaking point at a back-heavy 134 minutes, Gossip elicits a smile a time or two, but ultimately depends on the same indulgence in celebrity that it supposedly lampoons. Harsh irony for a film that seeks to deflate showbiz egos that the only people interested in watching such a spectacle are the very people clamouring for the juicy tidbits that feed a cult of personality. Regardless, the actresses to a one are interesting enough that it's impossible not to wish that Gossip had discarded the bulk of its unmanageable dross and brought to the fore any one or two of the intersecting storylines. As it is, Gossip is a colossal bore.
