It's pleasing to reflect that Chopin and Liszt - the two greatest pianist-composers of all time - were actually good friends rather than petulant enemies as might be expected, and any film about either of them has a bit of a warm glow from that. This film is all about temperament, but mainly that of George Sand rather than the keyboard colossi. To the film's credit they take lesser roles among the other slightly foolish men of Sand's entourage, which includes Delacroix and De Musset.Judy Davis is fabulous as Sand, strident, brittle but womanly. The film is fairly explicit about the gender-bending. "Chopin is not a man, but a woman" Sand's friend the Duchess (Bernadette Peters) tells her, "He has to be wooed". She turns up next day with flowers. It's fun, gossipy and theatrical and hard not to like. Even the performances that don't really work fail in a good-natured way: Hugh Grant as the sickly Chopin does diffidence better than he does intensity, and Julian Sands looks the part of Liszt far better than he speaks it.There's lashings of ironic humour on the absurdity of high art being subservient to base emotion, and the idea that genius has a foot in two worlds, one of them less noble, was well worth playing around with.

I am writing this because I've read 10 reviews and people seem to be taking this movie seriously. I don't understand. It's clearly a silly spoof of a film, not to be taken the least bit seriously. It's somewhat entertaining in that regard, though not particularly inspired. The acting is passable - though the more this is seen as intentionally silly, the better I would rate the acting. Whether it does the least bit of justice to George Sand, I'm not sure, but I hope not. Emma Thompson and Hugh Grant are pretty much wasted, since they are not especially comedic actors. Though as usual I enjoyed watching the sublime Mandy Patinkin, he can do no wrong in my eyes...Anyway, just don't expect a serious drama here...

It can be a disconcerting experience watching determined feminist George Sand pursuing such an insecure object of desire after the freethinking French author goes weak in the knees for the heavenly music of young Frederick Chopin. Judy Davis gets plenty of mileage out of Sand's confident iconoclasm (ignoring the low moment when she tries to win the composer's attention by exchanging her trademark trousers for a lacy dress patterned after the Polish flag), and her lively performance goes a long way toward overcoming the inadequacies of a script that is less witty than it would have us believe. For everyone else in the cast it's simply a costume party, and director James Lapine leaves them free to indulge in some shameless overacting (Emma Thompson, in particular, gives a rare irritating performance). The whole thing doesn't amount to anything more than a shallow, highbrow romantic comedy, but at least the music is good, and if nothing else the film helped support the costume design industry for several weeks.

I like strong women. Maybe i am weird in that way. George Sand was a strong woman. She knew what she wanted and she was willing to wait until she found it. In the meantime, she took a man's name, she dressed like a man, she smoked and cussed like a man, and she didn't call her lovers the next day either. That didn't keep them from running back panting and that made this movie hilarious.I had never seen Judy Davis before. She was in two movies last year (The Break-up and Marie Antoinette), but I'v not seen either one. She was magnificent in her role as George Sand. I think I use the word magnificent too much, so let's say she was stupendous and tremendous.Then she found him. The one she was waiting for. She knew the moment she heard his music. he could talk to angels. He was Frederic Chopin, and he was definitely not interested. No matter she plowed ahead, despite the interference of her best friend (Bernadette Peters)and ...well, I won't tell you if she succeeded as that would spoil it wouldn't it.With Hugh Grant, Mandy Patinkin and Emma Thompson helping Peters support Davis, this film had all one could wish for. It was an enjoyable romp through the countryside, funny, and a charming love story.