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In Irving Winkler’s bio-pic of Cole Porter, the composer who wrote "Anything Goes" and "Let’s Misbehave" and a seemingly endless string of other hits, Kevin Kline plays Porter as both a charming bon vivant and a nose-to-the-grindstone workaholic. Porter, who was married, was also gay, and this film sets straight several of the hilarious inaccuracies set forth in the film Night and Day, which starred Cary Grant as an unfailingly heroic Porter. His wife, played by Ashley Judd in the new film, knew about his homosexuality when she married him, but Winkler still portrays her as the love of his life, suggesting that they had a soulful understanding that transcends sexuality. It’s hard to buy, and so is the structure of this uneven film, which is by turns buoyant and stolid. Porter’s songs still make their mark, and the singing by Robbie Williams and Elvis Costello, among others, injects some life into an otherwise standard life-of tale. The set-up has an elderly Porter being shown his life story by an underused Jonathan Pryce and offering advice like "It’s too early for another song." The abruptness of these shifts in narrative detracts from the film’s real draw: the music, which for Porter fans will make this a must-see-and-hear. (125 minutes)
BY BROOKE HOLGERSON
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