Although its a fine film to look at it never really takes hold.Scott- Thomas acts well but James Wilby and Angelica Huston are very wooden and poorly cast.
The problem is that despite the painful emotional material the director just isnt up to the job.In more talented hands this Waugh novel could have been made into a memorable piece of cinema.
<this Waugh novel could have been made into a memorable piece of cinema.>
It certainly could have been made into a shallower more populist film but whether that would have made it better I don't know?
I was gripped by it until the ridiculous wind up mice appeared. I also realise real life is stranger than fiction and although that dramatic ploy, on the one hand was ridiculous, in real life I have known people do ridiculous things, so ultimately it was believable. I thought the acting was fine especially the main characters and the Alec Guiness part which apparently was taken from a real life report.
I thought it was a good insight into the class system and showed that for all his sophistication and status Tony was no more important than those folk living in the jungle who knew at first hand how to navigate their dangerous territory and eat from the wild so as to obtain health, where all Tony could teach his son was how to talk to "Nanny" and the rest of the lower classes.
As we wake up to the news that without refined oil most of us in the developed world would be naked and stationary, it is perhaps time for us to start learning what those who can live off the land can teach us. The ridiculously named "Credit Crunch" may turn out to be a message of salvation if only we will heed it, learn and change!
I think Alec Giness's great performance was wasted. What made Mr. Todd (Giness)think he is the father figure to the forest indians, the authority to them? In fact he is more like a guest to them just as Mr. Last. Why did he need to finish Mr. Washington, a black American?
shareTo answer the question, he slept with a bunch of the native women and is literally the father of their kids.
shareI think I know what you mean because the film could have been stylized to get the point across more powerfully. Still I thought it was memorable and quite well done and I enjoyed how faithful it was to the novel. The actors were not histrionic in the show-off way that usually gets attention. James Wilby was just like the character in the book - well to do, satisfied, and something of a blank slate behind which you can detect deeper emotion. He had subtle moments of expressiveness in the movie that impressed me. I actually thought Angelica Huston was perfectly cast and just the way I had pictured the character when I first read the novel. I keep thinking of a similar movie, the beautiful and underrated adaptation of The Painted Veil with Edward Norton & Naomi Watts. That picture was devastating and fully realized. Comparing it to this, I can see your point.
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