The Price of Desire

A well-meaning, but dramatically inert biopic.

Somehow the tacky piano score amplifies the ineptitude of Mary McGuckian’s direction, but even so one can’t fail to be impressed by a scene where Brady’s Gray literally dances about architecture, proving that it really is possible.

I came to McGuckian’s film knowing nothing about Gray and left feeling frustrated that I hadn’t learned more about her, apart from the boorish chauvinists in her life.

The Price of Desire is an indulgent, gauzy dream from memory, of Gray swanning around white rooms in white dresses uttering profundities in English and French — with white subtitles. It’s as visually inane, austere and pretentious as its dialogue.

The performances here are bloodless, the pacing listless, the dialogue witless almost to the point of deadpan parody.

It’s filled with risible dialogue, a visual style more suited to a Côte d’Azur fashion video (the slow motion, the tasteful, slightly obscured sex scenes), and plastered with an undistinguished score by Brian Byrne (“Albert Nobbs”).