Nov 23, 2008 10:03 AM
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Mind!! That’s what everything’s at The slime ball, the sloth and also the rumination of the past… That’s the mind. It always betrays you and it always tells you against the heart…
People are talented and people are not. They are themselves or someone else… Talent is LATENT… Latent is dormant and waiting to be explored waiting for the volcano to erupt. Waiting silently, almost mocking the stranger to surreptitiously enter someone's identity!!
In The Talented Mr. Ripley, Anthony Minghella Director of The English Patient has very adeptly conveyed this interchange with style, clever plot and fantastic locales.
Not only is the film extra ordinary in its content but its also extra ordinary in its screenplay. The way he has been able to make his actors move around just tells you how much the actors believe in him. Whether it’s the quiet seduction of Jude Law by Tom or the deliberate vengeance of Matt… It’s always about the role that the man plays and acts it to perfection!!
Talent is something that’s objective but when it comes to playing the part that you passionately love, you outdo the minds that work against you!!!
This mind bender of a film is a challenge to the most initiated and also the most awakened!! It’s not easy to understand but it’s also not too difficult to know… Vague?? I might get vaguer as I proceed…
It has intrigue, deceit and also the mind of a person who thinks beyond the present. Patricia Highsmith wrote a novel and then serialized the novel. There was a film made in 1960 called PURPLE NOON and then in 1999 The Talented Mr. Ripley was filmed again. After this the talents just stopped. I think it is because it has not received the followers that maybe needed to appreciate the deception drama which had the cold bloodedness of a sick mind or it has also not received the vision the man can to heighten the first effort… This is one film that challenges the boundaries of a mind and also how it can think diabolically...
Tom Ripley is a sad, endearing, nauseating and at the same time a heartless human who wants what he doesn’t have and who also envies what others have!! Dickie Greenleaf is a just an innocent victim who doesn’t understand what Tom has to do with his life at all!! Deception with innocence is what makes this film a true wonder!!
Instead of talking about the film its better to talk about the story in terms of Ripley and his nature. Ripley rips Dickies life, screws his mind and also his money He is trusted by Greenleaf’s father, all done with studied charm with a Princeton jacket, to ensure that he gets Dickie back to his hometown with a $1000 reward, but what ensues is a drama of life and its living hell that zaps the core of reasoning.
What if someone envies you? What if someone loves you? What if someone idolizes you??... It is a question of a fantasy of a sick mind…
We see Tom trying very innocently to convince Dickie of his Princeton days. He sometimes lies and is sometimes very honest too. But that’s Tom’s nature of lightning fast thinking. He just thinks faster and future. The time they spend on the beach together with Marge, Gwyneth Paltrow in Italy is where the innocent deception turns evil. Tom is already impersonating an old unknown from Princeton. In fact he takes sinister pleasure in telling Dickie about his fascination with impersonating people and does a take on Dickies father. Impersonating his voice asking Dickie to come back! Dickie is famously busy in his own world. He is now rattled by Tom’s sheepish grin, innocence laced with a devious mind and when he sees Tom wearing his clothes and things, Dickie is left speechless.
Tom: Do you always type letters? Why don’t you write them?
Dickie is reckless, charming and very private. His attitude towards life and Marge is that of a care free go getter with lots of élan and give-a-damn attitude to results and consequences. Tom is glued to Dickie completely. While in Italy Dickie meets a very rich girl called Meredith Louge, Cate Blanchett and the way Tom manipulates his way into her coterie is judiciously done.
Tom has now typed the pattern of Dickies life and is slowly but surely closing the distance of the dream that he has nurtured and is waiting in an intensely quiet way for his entry into the real world.
Tom: Forging signatures, telling lies and impersonating almost anyone!
Enter Freddie (Philip Hoffman)… Multi faceted and equally reckless, he is Dickies close circle of friends. Tom has the mind and the smile and the lies that encompass Freddie and Dickie into his world of innocent deception.
What does one do when you are smitten by a champagne life, reckless attitude, a boat to go sailing in and a beautiful girlfriend??
You acquire talent. Talent that will sail you into this world of charm, rub shoulders with the crème de la crème and even witness operas from the box seats.
Matt Damon has been deathly calm, sheepish at times and yet forceful and cruel in his demeanor as Tom. Thinking evil, deception and actually setting about coveting Dickies life is done with passion that will confuse you as a viewer. The experience of pity and hatred, two of the strongest emotions, will play subtly on your mind. That is how Minghella has played Damon into the skin of Tom Ripley.
Jude Law has élan and charm and a smile to kill for!! He has poured life in Dickies character. The love for Jazz, the sea and a near vagabond nature has come naturally to him. The last goodbye, as Dickie calls it, at the Jazz festival where he is shown enjoying himself, he very arrogantly says, “Maybe I should take up playing drums rather than the sax!” He is indeed a reason for Ripley to hone his talent and a subject apt for being terminated quickly.
Gwyneth Paltrow as Marge has a more difficult role to portray. She is in love with the reckless Dickie, tired of his elusive ways and also his hatred for confrontation. There is a subtle difference in her resentment that’s she mistakes for love. Her anguish and pain are apparent at being treated badly but she is also smitten by the fact that Dickie Greenleaf is her beau.
The script is amazing. The camera is elusive and fantastic in capturing the picturesque locales. The music is satisfying and if you love Jazz, there are some awesome pieces that will thrill you to a toe tapping reverie. Technically its brilliant!
There are so many things to write about this intelligent thriller but by reading it and writing it I am actually deceiving you!! The film is far superior to any review that is written.
When you have mentally decided to take on another’s life and his identity and his lifestyle you have to posses the extra ordinary talent of impersonating and forging that’s mans life. It has be a carbon copy of habits and tastes and then when the inevitable sets in, the inner fear gnaws and claws its way into the world where deception is always the rule but its to be conducted with honesty. If at all there is a bigger use of a metaphor or an antithesis, this is it!!
You can only deceive someone till you are convinced that you are him. When someone sees through the deception it naturally takes a twist where you are confused as to who you actually are!!
