In Prince of Persia, Jake Gyllenhaal pulls off the tremendous feat of becoming at once both more butch and more femme. Shot in Morocco, the plot revolves around a regicidal Royal who – eschewing more time-tested methods of removing his royal rivals (eg poison, gutting, beheading etc.) – devises a really outraegously convoluted plot whereby he’ll declare war on an innocent country, steal a magical dagger from a princess, and turn back time to a pivotal moment when (boo hoo!) he should have been the future king. Jake sets out to stop him.
So: Ben Kingsley, as the baddie, eats the furniture, and Ms. Fields once again revives her recurring role as an undercover English princess – though quite how she ends up in that desert beneath that duvet is beyond me. But it’s Prince-Charmingly-haired Jake who’s the most perplexing: doe eyed and recently buffed, very early on in the film, those Deliverance words sprang unbidden into my mind: “He got a real purdy mouth ain’t he?”
After that, I couldn’t really concentrate.