Constant Gardener?

Wow, you make an excellent point!

The Constant Gardener is a movie about a man who wants to do good for the world, who goes through the proper political channels to accomplish his goals, while the love of his life, who wants to do good for impoverished people living under a very corrupt government, is a very ambitious loose cannon, and, as a result, her body is pulled from car wreckage during the first scene. Both women are ravishing brunettes who bring their politically-oriented, small-framed brunet boyfriends home to bed a few hours after they meet.

Did I miss any other coincidences? I do remember that both male leads say, "You know me better than that!" while discussing the differences in each other's political style.

The similarities between Waking the Dead and The Constant Gardener are very superficial: Just a look at the trailers is already sufficient to discover them – you don’t have to be a genius to see it. So, I think it’s more important to stress the differences than to seek deeper similarities. (But also to see the differences you don’t have to be a genius).

I liked both films a lot. Waking the Dead because of the tragic, touching story of a lost love still there – but unreachable. And because of Billy Crudup: I don’t know his work very well (only a few films; I liked Charlotte Gray and Stage Beauty a lot), but I think his performance here was just enormously deep and not easy to achieve. But beside this: the film is rather shallow and not very lasting after you have seen it.

And that’s not the case with The Constant Gardener. After I’ve seen this film I was just sitting there and was shocked. You know: things like this happen, it’s very near to reality, people like this exist, people that follow a path ignoring all danger to their own life. You know this as well as Ralph Finnes (I don’t remember the name of the role) knows it. But anyway: most of us are very successful in ignoring this facts. This film brings it up again (if only for a short moment) You see, how Ralph Finnes (I don’t remember the name of the role) awakes after the death of his wife, finally realising that his world of diplomacy is just one part of reality.

When did Fielding Pierce awake? Did he awake after all? Or did he rest on his “being good” and curing the little sorrows of his voters, as we see it in the end of the film?
What did Sarah do? How did she fulfil the ambitions she told about in the beginning of the relation with Fielding? What was so important to her that there were such deep clashes between her and Fielding? And if her appearances during the campaign were real and she was still alive (what nobody can know – not even the writer): What cause prevented her from returning to Fielding? What was her new mission and her contribution to the world?

I don’t blame the film not to give answers to this – in my view – fundamental questions of both characters. Despite all similarities in the plot and the structures: The focus of both films is just different. And exactly this are the questions that mark the huge difference between both films. And just a little touch on some of them (not an entire focus on them) would have made Waking the Dead to a similar lasting film-experience as The Constant Gardener.

In Waking the Dead, the two lead characters obviously loved each other very much. The biggest problem I had with Constant Gardener was the one-sided relationship between the lead characters. Tessa (Rachel Weisz) never seemed to be in love with Justin (Ralph Fiennes). She was passionate about her work but not her husband. Justin, on the other hand, was madly in love with Tessa. I understand she was a good person, but he sure was awfully crazy about a woman who really shut him out. I bet after he died and got to Heaven, Tessa was like, "oh, hey... I actually have a new boyfriend up here, but thanks for investigating my death and all, buddy."