The Talented Mr. Ripley

• Cert:
• Cat.no: D 034679
• Running time: 133 minutes
• Year: 1999
• Pressing: 2000
• Region(s): 2, PAL
• Chapters: 25 plus extras
• Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
• Languages: English, Italian
• Subtitles: Italian, English for the hearing impaired
• Widescreen: 2.35:1
• 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
• Macrovision: Yes
• Disc Format: DVD 9
• Price: £19.99
• Extras : Scene index, Director’s commentary, Interviews with cast and Crew, “Inside The Talented Mr Ripley” documentary, “The Making Of The Soundtrack”, 2 Music Videos, Teaser trailer, Theatrical trailer.

Director:

Anthony Minghella

Cast:

Tom Ripley: Matt Damon
Dickie Greenleaf: Jude Law
Marge: Gwyneth Paltrow
Freddie Miles: Phillip Seymour Hoffman
Meredith: Cate Blanchett
Peter: Jack Davenport
Dickie’s father: James Rebhorn

Anthony Minghella‘s last film – The English Patient (1996) – scooped 9 Oscars and met with rapturous acclaim from all quarters. Just how do you follow that?

The answer was with The Talented Mr. Ripley – via connections with Sydney Pollack, whose company had acquired the movie rights to Patricia Highsmith’s classic tale of identity and deception. Initially hired to write the screenplay, once onboard he sought to helm the project as well.

It’s a story which has already been filmed, some 40 years earlier as Plein Soleil (starring French icon Alain Delon). This latest adaptation keeps closer to the tone and content of the book, however.

Despite it’s picturesque settings throughout Italy, and its extremely photogenic young cast, The Talented Mr. Ripley deals in rather less attractive matters. Beneath the gorgeous surface of both the locales and the main characters’ luxuriant existence, there lies an underbelly of festering tension, jealousy, deceit and – ultimately – murder.

It takes hold through the faltering motives and actions of Tom Ripley, sent by a wealthy New York Businessman to bring back his wayward son Dickie Greenleaf from his high-living exile in Europe. Subtle twists of fate are then precipitated by the arrivals of key personnel who threaten the idyllic fantasy the nerdy loner Ripley becomes obsessed with soon after ingratiating himself into Greenleaf’s social circle.

The recreation of late 1950s Italy is so vivid as to be breathtakingly impressive, Minghella’s love of the era’s classic Fellini movies such as La Dolce Vita clearly paying dividends, yet at the same time there is an alarming similarity to the aforementioned Plein Soliel. While it’s fair to say that by definition the two films are telling the same story in the same locations, Minghella has gone so far as to actually shoot The Talented Mr Ripley in a way which gives it virtually the exact same look and ambience as the 1959 version. Several scenes play like identikit reruns, which while technically admirable can also be rather distracting.

On the other hand, this is an altogether more complex and satisfactory piece than its predecessor, providing a deeper insight into the troubled psyche of Ripley. Matt Damon, in the title role, is seldom off-camera – which makes it vital to the film’s success that he conveys his dubious charms and flawed psychology. By and large Damon manages this, though more than two solid hours of Ripley’s insidious, unsettling and downright creepy presence eventually takes its toll on the film’s climactic effectiveness.

The opening hour’s magnificence only serves to emphasise the film’s subsequent shortcomings. Jude Law takes centre-stage as the devilishly handsome Dickie, who is blessed with a natural taste for the good life, and he is suitably captivating. It is he who remains the story’s focus throughout, and who quickly becomes the object of Ripley’s homo-erotic fascination. Law is perfectly cast as this dashing, ebullient rich boy around whom everything appears to revolve.

Meanwhile, the ever-lovely Gwyneth Paltrow adds yet another high-profile performance to her already bulging CV as Marge, Dickie’s glamorous fiancee. She brings her customary grace to the role, and as Minghella himself observes, “it’s like Grace Kelly walked straight out of those Hitchcock films into my movie”. Paltrow has rarely looked quite so beautiful, and the pairing with Jude Law is central to The Talented Mr Ripley‘s achievement of creating a realistically desirable scenario for Tom Ripley to be so fatally seduced by.

Extra characters not in the original novel have been created, adding further layers to the already intricate plot. Cate Blanchett‘s slightly daffy American-debutante-on-vacation is essentially a recurring motif that tends to deliberately appear at the most inconvenient moments. It’s a device which works surprisingly well, although as with Damon’s Ripley – but to a lesser extent, of course – her Meredith does have a slightly creepy demeanour at times. Like the other principal additions to the central trio of Ripley, Dickie and Marge (including a brief but crucial appearance from Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Dickie’s brash friend Freddie Miles), she has an important part to play in the sequence of events.

Once again, English Patient composer Gabriel Yared is on hand to provide another memorably haunting and evocative score. Music is an integral aspect of the film, with the Jazz music so prominent at the time featured to stunning effect – most notably the scene in a San Remo club where Ripley’s blossoming infatuation with Dickie (and his lifestyle) really begins to take hold.

Speaking of which, it’s a telling reflection upon the film industry that in the press interviews and various promotional material, the homosexual element of the story is played down to the point of omission. This is a curious ploy, since it is actually the main dynamic that underscores the entire movie, running as it does through nearly every scene and dictating the outcome of everybody’s individual fate.

The restoration of Ripley’s sexual orientation as featured in Highsmith’s book is the main difference between Minghella’s vision and Plein Soleil. As such, it alters the course of the story compared to the one the Delon film depicted, throwing in some clever surprises along the way which sustain the film’s impact.

Overall, this is high quality film-making on every level. Its weaknesses (Damon’s somewhat monotone portrayal of Ripley, Paltrow’s unfortunate descent into hackneyed dramatics towards the end, the remarkable visual similarity to Plein Soleil) are balanced out by some inspired casting choices, an intelligent script, and a general sense of artistry befitting a director of Anthony Minghella’s track-record and integrity.

Indeed, this integrity is one of the most apparent and refreshing things about the various behind-the-scenes material included on a remarkably packed Buena Vista disc. Minghella is a truly decent chap with a keen intellect and wonderful passion for honest, thoughtful and superlative movie-making. His insights and recollections of the project’s sometimes painful, often laborious genesis are fascinating and tinged with warm humour. It must be a treat to work with such a figure.

The rest of the cast add merely serviceable soundbites, although when they’re from the likes of Paltrow, Blanchett, Damon and Law you’re always going to be listening regardless. Essentially, their acting does the talking for them, anything they say outside of that is ultimately superfluous.

There is a wonderful look at the creation of the film’s sublime music score and soundtrack, which is above average and captures a vivid sense of what the composer was aiming for – Gabriel Yared is, for my money, the finest composer around in Hollywood. The two music videos are slightly unusual, since they are really promotional tools rather than actual MTV or Top 40 Chart fodder. Matt Damon does a decent version of My Funny Valentine, while Tuo Vu Fa L’Americano is the show-stopping tune from the San Remo part of the film.

Unless you have an incurable aversion to Matt Damon – he is in virtually every single scene of this rather lengthy movie – or else have little interest in the story, this is surely one of the most impressive UK DVDs yet to be released.

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