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Tom's Guide Verdict: 'Couture'Rating: 2/5 starsVerdict: "Couture" attempts to share a deep story of a woman going through a tumultuous time on numerous fronts. Instead, it delivers an unengaging but polished drama that struggles to hold its attention on its main character.Where to watch: See "Couture" in theaters now"Couture" is not your typical summer movie. It's no blockbuster by any means, nor was it intended to be a summer movie. Debuting at the Toronto International Film Festival last year, it's a pure drama film, pitched as being centered around an award-worthy performance from Angelina Jolie.To her credit, this movie's shortcomings aren't really Jolie's fault. In fact, that's the problem. If we got more of Jolie in this movie, maybe she'd have more opportunities to make or break this film. But for a movie that's supposedly centered around her and her emotional journey, she's missing from at least a third of it.Unfortunately, her absence seriously derails the movie. The other characters we focus on — there are three point-of-view characters in the story — aren't uninteresting, but Jolie remains the main focus of the movie, and so we don't spend enough time to sink into the other storylines either.In the end, the result is a surprisingly flat movie for a drama that clearly has ambitions of plumbing the depths of its characters' emotions. Jolie's character is going through genuine turmoil that should be engaging, but because the movie refuses to let us sit in her turmoil, our attention is free to wander.Malcolm has been with Tom's Guide since 2022. He watches dozens of new releases every year to make sure you don't have to watch any of the bad ones.Get the latest from Malcolm in your inbox'Couture' struggles to focus on its story
