A Review of Orson Welles’ “Citizen Kane”

This spring I continue to utilize my Netflix queue to take myself to “school” with film classics.  Earlier in the month I finally sat down to watch Citizen Kane in its entirety for a critical review.  Without further adieu…

CAPTION:  Say, Charlie, you gotta name for that sled?

All That Ballyhoo!, 5 May 2008

Author: David H. Schleicher from New Jersey, USA

On the Criterion Collection DVD of Orson Welles’ classic Citizen Kane there is an original theatrical trailer where Welles cleverly advertises the film by introducing us to the cast including the chorus girls, whom he refers to as some nice ballyhoo. That pretty much sums up my opinion of the often over analyzed film that always shows up at the top of the list of greatest films ever made. Even though this was the first time I sat down to watch the film as a whole, I knew everything about it from studying it in film class and from the countless number of essays, homages, and parodies that have come down the pike over the years. It seems impossible now to judge the film against a blank slate, but with great ballyhoo comes great scrutiny.

Released in 1941 by RKO as a Mercury Theater Production, Citizen Kane is the tale of an influential and shockingly wealthy newspaper tycoon (Welles) inspired by the life of William Randolph Hearst. The story follows the investigation into the origins of “Rosebud”-the mysterious word Kane utters on his deathbed. Following newsreel footage announcing Kane’s death, we are then thrust into a series of flashbacks through interviews with various people who knew Kane that reveal the nature of his character.

From a technical standpoint, Welles’ film is as innovative and engrossing today as it was yesterday. Every single piece of cinematic trickery, every dissolve, every long tracking shot, every seamless edit, every play with chronology, every special effect is perfect. Welles was audacious and inventive with his art, and it is for these technical aspects that Citizen Kane will always stand the test of time.

However, the story of Citizen Kane remains cold and distant. I didn’t instantly connect with the characters and the plot the way I did with other classics from the period like Casablanca or The Third Man or even more recently, There Will Be Blood. Often, the supporting players over-act, and the flashbacks are tedious (especially the one detailing Kane’s second marriage) or emotionless (like the scene showing Kane’s snow covered childhood). There’s a certain smug arrogance to the whole production that makes it seem like perhaps Welles was secretly making a comedy. It leaves one wondering how it would’ve come across had Welles actually been allowed to do a straight up biopic of Hearst.

Is it any wonder that so many critics today hail this as THE all time great? Much of today’s cinema is geared towards style and technique over substance, and way back in 1941, Welles was the first to author this very modern brand of cinema where the art is not in the story but how it is told and shown to the audience. His Citizen Kane is technically rich, layered, and enthralling but narratively vapid. Did I ever really care about Kane or Rosebud? No, but it was fascinating to watch. It’s some very nice ballyhoo indeed.

Originally Published on the Internet Movie Database:

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A Review of “Iron Man”

CAPTION:  Gwyneth Paltrow uses a military escort to pick up Robert Downey Jr. from rehab.

Adequate Cure for Cinematic Anemia, 6 May 2008

Author: David H. Schleicher from New Jersey, USA

The crown prince of America’s premier weapons manufacturer Tony Stark (a sober Robert Downey Jr.) grows a conscience after being captured by terrorists in Afghanistan and decides to fight for what’s right in an innovative piece of body armor technology that will henceforth be known as Iron Man in Jon Favreau’s predictable but fun Marvel comic film adaptation.

Wisely abandoning the corny mawkishness of the Spiderman films and the recent attempt to revive the Superman franchise, Iron Man instead offers up some light satire, bright-eyed cynicism, and an attempt at witty banter. The always lovely Gwyneth Paltrow is a delight as Stark’s sassy assistant Pepper Potts, and it’s nice to see her doing something light and fun for a change. Also part of the off-kilter cast are Terrence Howard as Stark’s inexplicable military friend and Jeff Bridges bald and bearded as Stark’s mentor (and dun dun dun…enemy?) Downey Jr. apparently ad-libbed much of the dialog, which sometimes falls flat, but for the most part works. It’s certainly far more enjoyable than the typical fan-boy in-jokes that plague most comic book movies.

Certainly this is no Batman Begins in terms of depth and scope of drama, but with slam-bang special effects and an effortless feel (despite a slow build up to the action), Iron Man certainly fits the bill as a better than average comic book/action film. Is it any wonder critics and audiences have embraced it so warmly after suffering through loud obnoxious dreck like Transformers?  While it has been a bit oversold, Iron Man proves that great special effects can be built around a smart story that doesn’t have to pander to the lowest common denominator. Until The Dark Knight it will have to cure our cinematic anemia.

Originally Published on the Internet Movie Database:

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Turning the Screws

Henry James’  classic novella from 1898, “The Turn of the Screw” opens with a group of friends discussing ghost stories:

“I quite agree–in regard to Griffin’s ghost, or whatever it was-that its appearing first to the little boy, at so tender an age, adds a particular touch.  But it’s not the first occurrence of its charming kind that I know to have been concerned with a child.  If the child gives the effect another turn of the screw, what do you say to two children–?”

“We say of course,” somebody exclaimed, “that two children give two turns!  Also we want to hear about them.”

Whereas Bram Stoker’s vampire novel Dracula is most thought of as the ultimate example of a horror story expressing the dangers of Victorian Era repression, there is no tale more subtly crafted around the theme than Henry James’ ghost story, “The Turn of the Screw.”

What has kept readers like myself up all night lost within its pages is the slow, methodical pacing and build-up that lead to a shocking climax.  Part of the suspense is in laboring through James’ carefully constructed, sophisticated, overly wordy, and charmingly antiquated prose.  You read on because you get a creeping sense of the disturbing subtexts while waiting almost painfully for something to happen at the end of all this analysis and talk.

Reading the novella in turn brought me to watch the 1961 film adaptation The Innocents.  It astounds as one of the best examples of a film honoring the spirit of its literary source material while standing alone as something purely cinematic.  It’s also creepy as hell in that very reserved old fashioned Victorian Era kind of way.  I highly recommend reading the novella first, and then viewing the film to compare and contrast.

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CAPTION:  Oh, let’s not get hysteric.  What would Freud say?

Atmospheric Translation of Classic Ghost Story, 5 May 2008

Author: David H. Schleicher from New Jersey, USA

Jack Clayton’s The Innocents is a wonderfully atmospheric film translation of Henry James’ classic Victorian Era ghost story, “The Turn of the Screw.” Highlighted by stunning black-and-white cinematography from Freddie Francis (who later worked on David Lynch’s The Elephant Man) and fabulous set designs, The Innocents stays very close to James’ text while adding a few cinematic elements (like the music box, highly suggestive visual symbolism, and the reading of a macabre poem) as it weaves its tale of a governess (Deborah Kerr) trying to unravel the mystery surrounding some strange apparitions on a lavish country estate where she cares from two young children displaying some odd behavior.

The brilliance of the film and the original story is in the ambiguity. There are two logical interpretations: the governess is slowly going mad, or the estate is haunted. Regardless of which interpretation you take, there is still plenty of room to intertwine the disturbing Freudian subtexts involving the governess’ repressed emotions and what the children have actually seen, heard, known, or experienced. I can’t think of a more refined or subtle exploration of what happens when an adult transfers or projects their own psychological hang-ups onto children in their charge than James’ quietly suspenseful potboiler.

The performances are a bit melodramatic at times, but note perfect in their proper context, with Kerr prissy but sympathetic and the children expertly performing the sudden turns from innocent angels to sinister manipulators. The Innocents does feature some dated sound effects that come across as annoying rather than creepy, but the visuals and the shrieking climax are what will stick with the viewer. Unlike recent (and for the most part very worthy) modern updates on the story like The Others and The Orphanage where a twist ending reveals the only true interpretation of the ghastly events, The Innocents leaves it all to the imagination of the viewer. The imagination, it seems, can be a very dangerous thing with which to play.

Originally Published on the Internet Movie Database:

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A Review of “Things We Lost in the Fire”

In 2004 it was Birth.  In 2005 it was The New World.  In 2006 it was Marie Antoinette.  Things We Lost in the Fire was the most unfairly dismissed and overlooked film of 2007.  Most audiences go to movies for escapism, and Things We Lost in the Fire flew in the face of that notion and dealt with subject matter that never lights the box office on fire but deserves to find its audience on DVD.

CAPTION:  Shhhh, Halle Berry, go to sleep.  No one needs to know you were in a movie that was actually good.

One Day at a Time…, 4 May 2008

Author: David H. Schleicher from New Jersey, USA

Sometimes you have to view movies one day at a time. As a film buff, I have to take the good with the bad. Danish director Susanne Bier’s first American venture, Things We Lost in the Fire is one of those surprisingly good human dramas that often gets lost in the shuffle and doesn’t receive the credit it deserves.

When Audrey (Halle Berry) loses her husband (David Duchovny) in a tragic Good Samaritan act gone bad, she deals with her grief in an unexpected way by inviting his drug-addicted best friend Jerry (Benicio Del Toro) to come live with her and her two young children while he “gets on his feet.” Featuring a music score designed to remind people of 21 Grams (which also starred Del Toro and played with many of the same themes) and interesting cinematography full of extreme close-ups and small visual details designed to evoke intimacy and realism, Things We Lost in the Fire delicately mirrors Audrey’s grief process against Jerry’s rocky recovery.

The film is far from perfect as it sometimes deals with subjects (especially the scenes where Jerry is withdrawing from heroin) in a clichéd manner. Berry also struggles as she seems to underact in some of the more poignant scenes as a way to balance her overacting in some of the more theatrical scenes. However, her performance as an organic whole is very strong, and her character and her family feel and look “real.” The things they say and the way they deal with their situations are raw and heartfelt without ever being sappy or sensationalistic. The kids are naturalistic, and they actually look like they could be the children of Berry and Duchovny. Del Toro is once again a revelation, and his performance speaks volumes with his mannerisms and facial expressions as he attempts to reconcile his sad past with a hopeful future. Sadly, his tour de force was overlooked by every end of the year awards in 2007.

The bread and butter, however, is in the small details. Things We Lost in the Fire uses visual motifs, side stories, character foils, mirroring, and nuanced repetition in dialog as ways to develop grander themes. This is the stuff of great novels, and rarely do we find it attempted in film. What could have easily been dismissed as a melodramatic weeper turns out instead to be something quite good. The overlapping closing scenes where Berry speaks not a word while coming in from the rain, and Del Toro delivers a rehab monologue that gives quite possibly the most honest insight into addiction and recovery ever captured on screen, is a hauntingly hopeful mosaic of small moments. Yes, there were some moments of formulaic Hollywood gobbily-gook and some moments of strained drama, but these closing moments are real. They are good, and we as human beings (as film goers) have to learn to accept the good.

Originally Published on the Internet Movie Database:

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A Review of Fritz Lang’s “M”

With nothing worthwhile at the cineplex this spring, I’ve been using my Netflix queue to catch up with many of the classics I studied in film class but never watched as a complete whole.  Fritz Lang’s M is one of those classics that looks great on your shelf, but you might only pop in the DVD player for that single scene or shot.  I’m not sure I could ever sit through it again fully because it’s so challenging and draining to watch.  This is the polar opposite of the film I explored earlier in the month, The Third Man, which I could watch again and again for the entertainment value.  That in itself is notable as M is often sited as one of the first films to flirt with noir, while The Third Man is considered by many to be the epitome of the movement.  As the film that bridged two significant gaps in film history (the gap between German Expressionism and Film Noir, and the gap between silent films and talkies), M also exists above the scrutiny of a modern film critic.  I decided to tackle it as I would have when I was a psychology major in college.  The film is endlessly fascinating in its symbolic imagery and psychological, sociological, and political underpinnings.

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“L” Before “M”, 21 April 2008

Author: David H. Schleicher from New Jersey, USA

In an eerie propagandist fashion, the phrase “in the name of the Law” is repeated over the last two scenes of Fritz Lang’s M as a child killer is brought to justice. If “L” represents the State and the Law, then “M” is meant to represent the Individual (who in this case is a Murderer). Lang boldly asked us way back in 1931, whose rights come first: the State or the Individual? A master of his craft, Lang leaves the question open-ended and let’s the audience decide.

M is shockingly contemporary in its psychological complexities. It explores the psychology of individualism vs. group think while showcasing how a state of fear can be inflicted upon a populace when a government fails to protect society from a single individual terrorizing the people. The story is fairly straightforward: An elusive citizen begins killing innocent children in a large nameless German city. The media fuels a paranoid frenzy that incites the public. The clueless police begin to raid “the underworld” after the populace is turned into a raving mob because of the failure to capture the killer. “The underworld” comes to a screeching halt as their business is ruined by the police and starts their own manhunt for the killer.

Unlike a modern period piece that attempts to evoke a certain place and time, M WAS a certain place and time. Lang, in an almost prophetic sense, captured the state of mind of the German people in 1931 as the Weimar Republic was on the brink of collapse and the Nazi Regime was preparing to take over. When individuals live in a state of fear, as they do in M, society collapses and the Individual is crushed. Only the State, it seems, can bring order.

M is a also a masterpiece for its technical aspects. The way in which Lang uses his camera to move through windows, capture shadows, reflections, empty spaces, and shift points-of-view is staggering even by today’s standards. He also played with the new technology of recorded sound with extensive voice-over narration and dialogue used to overlap and transition between scenes. Didn’t critics recently praise Michael Clayton for utilizing just such a technique as if it was something revolutionary? One can also see a protean style the would eventually birth the Film Noir movement with the creation of tension and suspense in the use of shadows and camera angles.

Yet M is not perfect. It has some major flaws. There are no real “characters” in the film to speak of in the modern sense. The film is virtually all built around mood and plot. The only time Lang invites us to emotionally connect is in the opening and closing scenes with a mother of one of the victims, and in the classic scene of Peter Lorre giving his writhing and primal “I can’t help it!” speech in front of the kangaroo court of criminals. The mother’s grief and Lorre’s madness are presented so sparsely and in such a raw form that it becomes too painful to want to connect with them. Another flaw that is often overstated about films from this time period is the slow pace of the early police procedural scenes. These inherent flaws combined with the inherent brilliance of Lang’s vision make M one of the most challenging films a modern viewer could ever sit through.

What impressed me most about M was the subtlety of the symbolism Lang created with his haunting images. As harrowing as the story is, none of the gruesomeness is shown on screen. It’s all transmitted to the viewer through the power of suggestion. Is it any wonder Hitler wanted Fritz Lang for his propaganda machine, which thankfully led to Lang fleeing to America? I’ll never forget the wide shots of the kangaroo court (and the looks on those people’s faces as the killer is brought down the steps for trial) or the vast expanse of that empty warehouse. The scene of the ball rolling in the grass with no one to catch it, the balloon caught in the telephone wires, and the empty domestic spaces the mother has to inhabit after her child has been murdered are the types of scenes that tape into Jungian archetypes and shared fears. The look on Lorre’s face as he confesses, the hand of the Law coming down to save Lorre from being lynched, and the ghastly plea from the mother in the final scene will stick with me for the rest of my life. 

M is a communal nightmare; one that from which we have yet to awake.

Originally published on the Internet Movie Database:

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For further exploration, some of major themes of M can be found in the following films:

The horrors of group think: Tod Browning’s Freaks (1932)

The stalking and murder of innocence:  Charles Laughton’s Night of the Hunter (1955)

Individuals crushed while under the surveilance of the State:  Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s The Lives of Others (2006)

The unraveling of communities and individuals when children are threatened: Ben Affleck’s Gone Baby Gone (2007)

For the Love of Pete!

Part of the wonder of a living language is reviving dead words and phrases.  When I recently began to toy with the idea of doing a series of novels set in the 1920’s, 1930’s, and 1940’s, I began to wonder if my knowledge of The Little Rascals would be enough to create that period dialog that would truly zing.  While doing a scant bit of research on the internet, I came across some of my favorite sayings and words from those “Old Timey” days.  It was quite funny to realize many of these antiquated phrases have been used by me for some time (for instance, my favorite, For the love of Pete!, or my referring to friends or contemporaries as kids).  Anyone who knows me knows my fondness for creating catch phrases and playing with words, so here’s a list of some of the best that I think should be put back into everyday use:

For the love of Pete! – a versatile exclamation that can be used in almost any situation but is often delivered as a complacent complaint.

Source:  Pete, the dog from The Little Rascals.

Usage:  Ethel said to Abner, “When’re you gonna cut that lawn?”  To which Abner replied, “For the love of Pete, Ethel!  I woulda done did it yesterday if it would get you to shut your trap!”

The Wreck of Hesperus — a mess; a fiasco; a potentially calamitous situation.

Source: 19th century poet Henry Wordsworth Longfellow.

Usage:  The apartment looked like the wreck of Hesperus after the party.

Affrighted — to become frightened or scared.

Source:  Victorian Era novels.

Usage:  The sallow specter of the dead governess left me quite affrighted.

Side Note:  Adding a soft “a” to the front of any verb will make the cut of your jib jive in that Old Timey way.  For instance:  Last Sunday I went avisiting and met a baby and a dingo.  Tonight, I plan to go out adrinking.

Dinners — a woman’s bosom; visible cleavage.

Source:  Old Timey grandmaws.

Usage:  Oh dear, that little trollop has her dinners all ashowing in that dress!

A Real Brick — a good friend or confidant.

Source:  The book and the film Atonement.

Usage:  Gee, Sally, you’re a real brick for listening to me tonight.

Rather — an often sarcastic declaration of a defeatist attitude or disgruntled agreement in the wake of a long story or statement.

Source:  Graham Greene novels.

Usage:  Martha said to George, “Well I’d say he slipped off the wagon tonight with that old scallywag.”  To which George might have replied, “Rather!”

Get out but quick — self explanatory, see?

Source:  The classic noir film Double Indemnity.

Usage:  Laura said to Clyde, “Suppose you get out of here before I slap you.”  To which Clyde replied, “Suppose I do get out, get out but quick.”

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I’d say we start using at least one of these phrases everyday!  So hop to it, kids!

And we’re off…

(in a cloud of dust).

What are some of your favorite Old Timey phrases and words?

For further Old Timey fun, check out these hilarious explanations of Old Timey names:

http://oldtimeytimes.blogspot.com/2006/02/old-timey-names-explored.html

The Thief Maker Named Finalist in Eric Hoffer Awards

Nearly a year and a half after its publication, my novel The Thief Maker continues to accumulate accolades.

The Thief Maker was recently named a Finalist in the 2008 Eric Hoffer Award for Independent Books.

Though it will not be taking home one of the grand prizes, being named a Finalist places The Thief Maker in “the top 10% of entrants to be considered for prizes…Less than 50 books each year are dubbed with the title of Eric Hoffer Award Finalist.”

The complete list of finalists can be found below:

http://hopepubs.home.comcast.net/~hopepubs/HAcategoryfinalists.html

Grand prize winners in each category will be announced April 22, 2008.

Eric Hoffer was one of the most influential American philosophers and free thinkers of the 20th Century.  His books are still widely read and quoted today.  Acclaimed for his thoughts on mass movements and fanaticism, Hoffer was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1983.  Hopewell Publications awards the best in independent publishing across a wide range of categories, singling out the most thought provoking titles in books and short prose, on a yearly basis in honor of Eric Hoffer.

 

Cooperstown Travel Log

In honor of the opening week of baseball season, I took a road trip with my brother and a friend up to Cooperstown, NY to visit the Baseball Hall of Fame.  It was the first time I had been back since I was a child.  Though cold (and rainy on the last day), it was the perfect time of year to go to avoid the crowds that typically swamp the small village nestled below the mountains beside Lake Ostego during the summer months.  The quaint town was practically all ours for the taking (spare for some bus tours and kids at the Hall of Fame), and it was great to be able to mingle with the genuinely friendly and sometimes eccentric locals (especially on the first night at the only two bars in town open past midnight).

Below are some of the images and landscapes I was able to capture during my brief stay. 

Main Street Cooperstown

Main Street Cooperstown

Hall of Fame Gallery

Ty Cobb

Baseball History

Baseball Art

Orb over Bleachers

Lake Ostego

Lakefront Property

Lake Ostego Resorts

Rising Waters

Sentinel Tree

Looming Branches

Countryside

Mountain Mist

 

A Review of Carol Reed’s “The Third Man”

CAPTION:  In 1949, this Valli was located in GreeneLand.

CAPTION:  In the best of film noir, a viewer can actually feel the dampness and breathe in the darkness.

The Trouble with Harry Lime, 1 April 2008

Author: David H. Schleicher from New Jersey, USA

I initially felt a fool for not having seen The Third Man earlier. However, in retrospect, having now read most of Graham Greene’s major works, and having received some keen insight into the back-story of producer Alexander Korda through Kati Marton’s book The Great Escape, I feel I was able to enjoy The Third Man even more for the staggering masterpiece that it is.

As a European/American co-production bankrolled by two legendary hands-on producers, David O. Selznick and Alexander Korda, The Third Man was masterfully crafted by director Carol Reed from a screenplay by British novelist Graham Greene. The film served as a pinnacle of the film noir movement and is a prime example of master filmmakers working with an iconic writer and utilizing an amazing cast and crew to create a masterwork representing professionals across the field operating at the top of their game.

Fans of Greene’s novels need not be disappointed as the screenplay crackles with all that signature cynicism and sharp witted dialogue. Carol Reed’s crooked camera angles, moody use of shadowing and external locations (Vienna, partially bombed out, wet and Gothic, never looked more looming and haunting) and crisp editing are the perfect visual realizations of Greene’s provocative wordplay and often saturnine view of the world. Reed’s brief opening montage and voice-over introducing us to the black market in Vienna is also shockingly modern, as it is that energetic quick-cut editing that has influenced directors like Scorsese to film entire motion pictures in just such a style. Also making the film decidedly timeless is the zither music score of Anton Karas, a bizarre accompaniment to the dark story that serves as a brilliant contradiction to what is being seen on screen.

The story of The Third Man slides along like smooth gin down the back of one’s throat as characters, plot and mood meander and brood along cobblestone streets and slither down dark alleys in an intoxicated state. Heavy drinking hack writer Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten, doing an excellent Americanized riff on Graham Greene himself) arrives in post WWII occupied Vienna to meet up with his old pal Harry Lime (Orson Welles) only to find that Lime is reportedly dead, the police (headed by a perfectly cold Trevor Howard) don’t seem to care, and Lime’s charming broken-hearted mistress (Alida Valli, perfect as another Greene archetype) has been left behind. Of course, Martins can’t leave well enough alone as conspiracy, murder, unrequited romance, and political intrigue ensue. Welles benefits greatly from being talked about for most of the film and appearing mostly in shadows spare for two scenes: the famous ferris wheel speech, and a climatic chase beneath the streets of Vienna through Gothic sewers. His top hap, dark suit, and crooked smile are the stuff of film legend.

The side characters, however, are what make The Third Man such a rich, rewarding experience. We’re treated to small glimpses into the mindsets of varying people ranging from a British officer obsessed with American Western dime-store novels (of which Martins claims his fame) to an Austrian landlady eternally wrapped in a quilt going on and on in her foreign tongue as international police constantly raid her building and harass her tenants. The brilliance is that one needs no subtitles to understand her frustration. These added layers of character and thoughtful detail, hallmarks of Greene, set The Third Man in a class above the rest of film noir from the late 1940’s era.

Make no mistake, The Third Man is arguably one of the most finely crafted films ever made. One’s preference towards noir and Greene’s world-view will shape how much one actually enjoys the film. For the sheer fact it has held up so well over the decades and has clearly influenced so many great films that came after it, its repeated rankings as one of the greatest motion pictures ever made can not be denied. With a good stiff drink in hand, and Graham Greene’s collection dog-eared on my bookshelf, The Third Man is undoubtedly now one of my favorite films. Reed’s closing shot of a tree-lined street along a cemetery and Joseph Cotten leaning against a car smoking a cigarette while Alida Valli walks right past him with that zither music score playing is one that has left an indelible mark on my memory and enriched my love of film as art.

Originally Published on the Internet Movie Database:

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CAPTION:  On the outside Joseph Cotten is as cool as cucumber, but on the inside, the hopeless romantic screams at Alida Valli, “Don’t walk away!”

Director Anthony Minghella, Dead at 54

 

As I write this, the details are sketchy, but it’s been confirmed that Oscar-winning film director Anthony Minghella has died at the age of 54.  At the turn of the millennium, Minghella was the go-to man for star-studded, moderately budgeted, profit-making, literary minded prestige films. 

In 1996, he achieved his greatest success with his film adaptation of Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient.  The film will always hold a special place in my memory.  As a junior in high school, it was the first film I saw at the Ritz Theater in Voorhees, NJ, which at the time had just opened as the premier art-house venue in the Philadelphia suburbs.  Combining the epic styling of David Lean with the gritty sensuality of Bernardo Bertolucci, The English Patient left an indelible mark and won 9 Oscars including Best Picture and Best Director for Minghella.  1996 was considered the year of the independent film with the neo-classic Coen Brothers’ film Fargo and Mike Leigh’s insightful Secrets & Lies among those films competing with Minghella’s period piece.  The English Patient was the crowning jewel of that independent Hollywood mindset that was rallying against big budgets and small minds.  It represented the pinnacle of Miramax Studio’s prowess as the premier prestige film distributor, and it launched Minghella onto the A-list.  The film so infected the pop culture upon its release, that it was ironically immortalized as the film Elaine Bennis from Seinfeld will always hate.  She would’ve rather seen Sack Lunch! 

In 1999, Minghella delivered his adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s novel, The Talented Mr. Ripley, which featured some of the hottest young actors and actresses of the moment (Matt Damon, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Cate Blanchett, and then relatively unknown Philip Seymour Hoffman).  The studio marketed the film as a classy, picturesque, throwback to the heyday of Hitchcock’s stylized VistaVision thrillers.  Knowing nothing of the literary source material and fooled by the clever marketing and rave reviews, I went to see the film with my mother at Christmastime while home from college.  About thirty minutes into the picture when we realized this was no lightweight Hitchcock homage, but instead a psychosexual thriller about a homosexual serial killer, it made for the most uncomfortable movie-going experience of my life.  Again, defying our expectations, and making his audience squirm, Minghella left his mark.

In 2003, Minghella tackled Charles Frazier’s ridiculously successful novel, Cold Mountain.  While the vapid romance at the film’s core and the often vulgar episodic odyssey of Jude Law’s character left many wishing for more restraint, the film is still memorable for some of the most well staged Civil War battle scenes ever captured on film and Renee Zelwegger’s Oscar-winning supporting turn as a fast-talking migrant farm-hand from Texas who befriends Nicole Kidman’s character.

Minghella will always be remembered for this trilogy of high profile literary film adaptations, but he also excelled with smaller films.  His 1990 feature debut, Truly Madly Deeply, featuring Alan Rickman as a dead musician who sticks around to comfort his grieving girlfriend, has developed a rather rabid cult following over the years.  His most recent film, 2006’s Breaking and Entering, in which he reunited with muse Juliette Binoche (whom he directed to an Oscar win in The English Patient) and Jude Law, barely registered as a blip at the box office last winter, but you can be sure it will be added to my Netflix queue now.

Many have dismissed Minghella’s style as overwrought and his successes overrated.  I’ll always remember him as one of the directors who most influenced my movie-going habits during my formative years as a film buff.  Minghella was a director of refined tastes and impeccable staging.  He was quite adept at making heavy-handed techniques seem naturalistic on screen and was never afraid to challenge an audience.  His style of direction has fallen out of favor recently in Hollywood.  Just look at how hard the recent Atonement (a film that owes a world of debt to The English Patient and even featured a winking cameo of Minghella) had to work to eek out its respectable $50 million dollar domestic gross and gain that coveted Best Picture nomination.  It will be directors like Atonement’s Joe Wright who will carry on Minghella’s legacy.  Minghella in 2008 seemed poised for his next evolution as a director and was talented enough to stage a comeback.  At age 54, he is gone too soon, and will be greatly missed.