Movie review: 'Penelope' cursed by desperation

Crushingly winsome, "Penelope" aims to be a magical modern romance, but there's no enchantment. It begins in glossy, bedtime-story form as Christina Ricci relates the curse of the wealthy Wilhern family. Every daughter would have a pig snout; only a blueblood's true love would offer a cure. After generations of sons Penelope (Ricci) is born into our modern, superficial world, where she is raised in seclusion by her dad (sedate Richard E. Grant) and mom (Catherine O'Hara, waving her hands in a highly emotional, mannered substitute for acting).

Now old enough to marry, Penelope attracts scads of cads with her riches, but repels them all with her porcine proboscis. It's a gender-swap "Beauty and the Beast." Her disfigurement is kept secret by confidentiality contracts until one bounder bolts before signing and joins forces with tabloid reporter Lemon (Peter Dinklage) to expose the facts. They recruit Max (James McAvoy), an aristocrat with a gambling problem, rig him with a hidden camera, and aim to publish his snaps of the pig-faced heiress. Upset, Penelope runs off into the city where she learns some lessons about self-acceptance with the help of a spunky motorscooter messenger (Reese Witherspoon, who also produced the film).

"Penelope" sat unreleased for two years, and no wonder. It's a shambles, so inexpertly timed and clumsily directed by newcomer Mark Palansky that it seems like a first-draft edit of some hopeless, abandoned project. The setting is London, but half the cast affects flat American accents. The stalwart McAvoy seems defeated by scenes that require him to fall ardently in love with a girl who hides behind a one-way mirror and speaks to him through a public address system. There's a valid if painfully flat message about inner beauty here, but it's lost amid all the desperate comic bustle. If there were a drinking game around how many times O'Hara's character falls down in shock, you'd be legless by the third reel. This little piggy should have stayed home.

Colin Covert • 612-673-7186