Wednesday, 03.19.08
The Talented Mr. Minghella
TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images
Minghella won his Oscar for The English Patient, a gorgeous, literary, faintly silly epic that cross-pollinated Casablanca with Lawrence of Arabia and reduced those moviegoers too snobbish to weep at Titanic to tears. But his best film by far was his adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley, which remains criminally underrated almost a decade after its release.
With its literary pedigree, pretty-person cast and gorgeous Italy-in-the-Fifties setting, Ripley tends to be lumped in with The English Patient and Cold Mountain, Minghella's middling Civil War epic. But Ripley was a richer, darker, less romantic and more psychologically subtle film than either of the late director's other big-budget efforts. Moreover, despite complaints from Patricia Highsmith's fans, it was a rare adaptation that actually improved on its source material. Matt Damon's tormented, all-too-human Tom Ripley - a sexually-confused Gatsby with an unexpected aptitude for murder - is ultimately a more interesting character than Highsmith's murderous ubermensch, whom she memorably described as "suave, agreeable and utterly amoral." The movie's Ripley stumbles into evil, rather than embracing it insouciantly; he's a hollow man seeking status, validation and even love, rather than a breezy, cultured nihilist. The book is a slight and cruel entertainment; the movie is a disturbing American tragedy.
It's also one of the movies that launched Philip Seymour Hoffman into the ranks of supporting actors whose turns you never, ever want to miss; the movie that made Jude Law a leading man (for better or for worse); and the film that proved - though many people were too caught up in Law's magnetic, star-making turn to notice - that Matt Damon was something more than Ben Affleck's fair-haired half. Damon's done good work since (though his heartthrob status and action-movie work ensure that he's consistently underrated as an actor), but none of his roles have harnessed the sinister side of his wide-smiling charm quite like the disturbing, riveting work he turned in under Anthony Minghella's supervision.
Rest in PeaceThe director was concerned with "seeing beyond roles assigned by hierarchy or education," David Carr writes in his obit. |
Best directorThe English Patient is a "sort of Casablanca for our time," John Krewson wrote of Minghella's Oscar winner... |
Hill of beans... while David Aaron Murray suggested that the film's "moral and spiritual isolationism" make it a kind of anti-Casablanca. |
A man of many mediumsAlex Ross says Minghella's Butterfly offers "several of the most piercingly beautiful images I've seen in an opera house." |
In his own wordsCharlie Rose interviews the late director. |
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Nice job, RD, on this tribute to Minghella. I think you give The English Patient short shrift, but your take on Ripley is spot on. We need more Minghellas in this world, not fewer. Film-making, like any other medium, is only as effective, beneficial, heart-rending, as we make it. Minghella knew how to tell a story in such a way that it appealed to our senses as well as our intellect. For instance, in one of many memorable scenes in The English Patient, he seamlessly shifts from the hollow of Kristen Scott Thomas' neck to the sandy dunes of the Sahara desert, cinematically portraying a thread throughout the story-- the juxtaposition or even competition between the passion, complexity and volatility we experience in human relationships (the characters' love affair), vs. those we observe on a geopolitical scale (WWII and the limits of nationalism). Film making at its finest provokes thought, and evokes deeper understanding of humanity. Minghella was one of a small handful who seemed to understand this-- and he left us a treasure trove, though cut short, of films that exhibit this understanding.
For another good Ripley film find the overlooked Ripley's Game with John Malkovich as the older Ripley.
Other adornments to Ripley not to be left out include a sterling soundtrack release, Gwyneth Paltrow, and for me, my awakening to the astounding screen presence of Cate Blanchett. I am an admirer of Paltrow, but her agent should make sure she isn't cast together with Blanchett again.
Great post on Ripley. I agree 100%. Superb movie.
Half-agree with you on Ripley. Agree that it was a fantastic movie, don't agree with you that it was superior to the book. The first three books in the Ripliad - I haven't read the other two - are stupendously well written thrillers with some serious depth to them. Read Ripley's Game if you don't believe me. And as Eric K says, do find the film version of it. John Malkovich almost perfectly captures Highsmith's Ripley.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. The fact that the Academy overlooks the best material no longer surprises me, but I was heartbroken when Matt Damon's brilliant Tom Ripley was bypassed. Perhaps it has to do with what your earlier poster said. Speaking for myself, the work as a whole is so disturbing that despite having purchased the DVD the week it was released years ago, I've only been able to watch the film once since.
The real brilliance of Minghella's version as compared to the book (which I've read) is that while Highsmith introduces us to a person that we dread and whose motivations we easily recognize, Minghella showed us a person that we all could very well be ourselves. Perhaps the true horror of 'The Talented Mr Ripley' is that we recognize that a great many of us have a lot of Ripley inside us.
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I found Ripley to be so unsettling that I do not want to see it again. Cold Mountain just knocked me totally out. I was so enthralled that I bought the novel (a superb poetic masterpiece), bought the soundtrack, bought the sheet music for piano, bought the DVD. I don't know why people were turned off Cold Mountain. From my extensive reading of the Civil War era, this was an honest representation of what really happened, violence, hatred, murder and all. It is a heart breaking film; unlike the "...there will always be another day" sloppy ending of "Gone with the wind", this film ends with sorrow, just as it should have.
Minghella's films are very important and his presence in the world will be greatly missed. My heart goes out to his family.
Posted by Fred Houpt | March 19, 2008 5:07 PM