Scott/Crowe melodrama slightly overripe

Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe's second project together has none of the same energy or vitality of their last project, "Gladiator," and the pair's upcoming "American Gangster" looks to pack serious heat. For now, though, we have a relatively lighthearted melodrama in "A Good Year," a movie with a concept worthy of a Lifetime Original, but with a unique performance by Crowe that nearly transcends the simple, standard formula.\nThe plot, based on the novel by Peter Mayle, finds Russell Crowe's Max Skinner, a profit-driven British stockbroker, inheriting an expansive vineyard in France from his late uncle (a typically moving Albert Finney). Max is your average power player; obsessed with money and in disregard of the simple, nuanced things in life for favor of the hard bottom line. You might think you know where this is going, and you'd be right. After inheriting the vineyard, where he spent much of his youth, he becomes slowly enamored with life's simpler pleasures, and quaint life lessons are learned as Max begins to favor the big picture over the day's market closing numbers.\nThe film's saving grace is Crowe, who, for all the reasons audiences have to dislike his character, exudes a presence and star quality that make sense of why he's such a sought after actor these days. Carefully balancing Max's despicable qualities with a subtle humor and wit that make him alternately pathetic and sympathetic, Crowe delivers a fully realized character in the midst of a partially realized film. Also delivering is cinematographer Philippe Le Sourd, who makes a case for the south of France as the most aesthetically gorgeous spot on Earth.\nThere are those who argue Scott should stick to action epics, and "A Good Year" mostly proves them to be correct. The movie is allowed to slip into a predictable pattern that films like Scott's own "Gladiator," "Kingdom of Heaven" and "Black Hawk Down" never ventured near, suggesting that Scott weaves his best tales amidst the blood and strife of man's conflict against the violent nature of mankind, not one man's conflict against himself.