Stop me if you think that you’ve heard this one before: there’s a clever guy in love with a beautiful girl, but his unconventional looks mean that he’s afraid to speak his heart—and anyway, she’s in love with a handsome newcomer.
As Peter Dinklage puts it in the trailer below, the solution seems to be for our hero to confess his feelings through the slow-witted newcomer: “my words on your lips”. Dinklage is the sword-fighting poet Cyrano, in a new screen musical arriving in UK cinemas this February 14.
Every rom-com version of this story you’ve seen, from The Half Of It to Roxanne, is based on the original 19th century play Cyrano de Bergerac. But Atonement director Joe Wright is stripping the whole thing back to its romantic, chivalrous roots, making the kind of big-hearted movie musical we haven’t seen in quite a while.
The trailer below shows love letters scattered in the air, a corseted Haley Bennett singing and billowing down staircases, and some swashbuckling sword action by firelight.
It’s all very old-school, bodice-ripping stuff, but perhaps this version of Cyrano will allow its Roxanne a bit more modern-day agency. As love interest Christian, Kelvin Harrison Jr. earnestly implores, “we must let her decide our fate, she must have the choice!”
A classic love triangle done in Wright’s lavishly classic style, Cyrano might just sweep audiences off their feet in 2022: the next best thing to buying pricey ballet or opera tickets, considering the lush production design and old-world storytelling on display here.
