Tulip Fever

I really love period dramas and, despite everything I had heard, I still thought I might like Tulip Fever so I went to see it last night.  It looked absolutely beautiful in the previews and it has a stellar cast so how bad could it be?  It is pretty bad.  Set in 17th Century Amsterdam, Sophia (Alicia Vikander) is an orphan essentially sold to Cornelis Sandvoort (Christoph Waltz), a wealthy merchant, because he is desperate for an heir.  She fails to produce said heir but he treats her kindly.  He hires Jan Van Loos (Dane DeHaan), a struggling artist, to paint their portrait and of course he falls in love with Sophia and they begin an affair.  In an attempt to be with Sophia, Jan begins speculating in the tulip market, where fortunes can be won and lost in an instant, with the help of the Mother Abbess (Judi Dench) who raised Sophia.  Maria (Holliday Grainger), Sophia's maid, is in love with a fishmonger named Willem (Jack O'Connell) who also speculates in the tulip market but when his fortune is stolen by an unscrupulous prostitute (Cara Delivigne) he is conscripted into the navy.  Sophia and Maria's stories converge in a ridiculous plot twist and the ending is anything but satisfying.  This movie is beautiful with gorgeous period costumes and lighting straight out of a Vermeer painting.  However, there are so many things wrong.  The story is convoluted but, even worse, it is also totally implausible, especially one plot element that defies common sense.  I didn't understand any of the characters' motivations.  Christoph Waltz usually plays such a good villain but in this movie his character is almost benign so I didn't understand Sophia's desperation to escape from Cornelis.  Sophia and Jan barely speak five words to each other before they are in bed together so I didn't really buy their relationship.  I also didn't understand Sophia's choice at the end of the movie.  What a letdown after everything the characters have been through!  The tone of this movie is also quite strange.  It is supposed to be a tense and compelling drama but there are some odd comedic elements, especially regarding a "little soldier" in some of the strangest sex scenes I've ever seen.  I also found the scenes where the tulips are bought and sold, which should be fraught with tension because of the consequences for the characters, to be incredibly boring.  It was a bit disappointing and I recommend giving it a miss.