The Talented Mr Ripley [DVD]

The film is excellent with an amazing performance by Matt Damon in the title role and a generally solid supporting cast including, among others, Jude Law, Cate Blanchett, Philip Seymour Hoffman (all excellent) and the singularly annoying Gwyneth Paltrow. I am sorry to say that I found her performance cringeworthy. Then again, I didn't much care for her character either, so maybe it doesn't matter all that much. Hey, it may even be intentional. Anyway, I still enjoyed the film very much and won't mark it down on the grounds of her performance.The tale of the young and deceitful conman and impersonator Mr Ripley is full of suspense and kept me on the edge of my seat throughout. And that even though I knew how it would end, having seen and being a great fan of the earlier (French) film version "Plein Soleil" from 1960 with Alain Delon as leading man. This is one remake that lives up to the original. For me anyway.The film is beautifully shot in many glorious Italian locations (Rome, Venice, Naples among others). Really a joy to watch. However, it may not appeal to those who expect an uplifting or inspirational ending. This is a film about a brutal and despicable criminal, albeit a goodlooking and very personably one. Don't expect a Disney ending.Now a few words about the DVD I bought (I have attached a photo of the cover since reviews for DVDs tend to appear for various different DVD and Blu-Ray editions of the same film which may be of different quality): Picture and sound quality are very good. Language and subtitle options are as listed in the product description. Most importantly: there are optional English subtitles for those who may need them. Also included are a goodly number of extra features: - Teaser Theatrical Trailer - Theatrical Trailer - Inside The Talented Mr. Ripley - Making of the Soundtrack - "My Funny Valentine" Music Video - "Tuo Vu Fa L'Americano" Music Video - Feature Commentary with Director Anthony Minghella (very nice)

The book is brilliant. This film is ghastly. Couldn't decide whether it was a comedy, a thriller or a musical.Jude Law might have been a good Ripley - he has that sort of strangeness, the detached quality of Tom Ripley in the book. (I wonder that no-one has written a weird musical film for him - something like the wonderful Beetlejuice, perhaps. He was at his best, I thought - or rather, in his best role - in AI Artifical Intelligence.)All Highsmith's books are about the outsider, who is a bit odd but a lot less odd than the so-called normal people. And it's the badgering of the "normals" that causes the trouble t start - after that, it's the old story of one false step and down the slippery slope. What's intriguing is that one finds oneself unable to judge the characters.The Alain Delon version, Plein Soleil, isn't bad. There is also a good German film of Edith's Diary. But I'd still say - read the books!

A strange and surreal movie. Damon, Law and Hoffman all put in great performances, beautifully shot, and the dreamlike quality of the movie is haunting, but there are a couple of major issues.The movie is overly long, which compounds the irredeemably stupid decisions that the protagonist makes at almost every point in the movie. The primary issue here is the writing and, I assume, a faithfulness to the source material which I admit to not having read. Of course, human beings make poor decisions, but Damon's character appears utterly brain dead and his choices come across as contrived, serving only to set up the next unlikely scenario and flog the same dead horse, adding and saying nothing that hasn't already been well covered by that point. Were the movie half an hour and two moronic decisions shorter, the movie would be more effective. In a similar vein and as something of a side note, the female characters here are shallow and uninteresting, serving only as plot devices.Secondly, the film has an utterly bizarre score which works in the movie's quieter moments as characters move through the streets of gorgeously filmed European cities, but undermine the tension when things inevitably begin to take a gruesome turn.Worth watching and certainly an interesting movie, but not an entirely effective one. It plays like an arty Catch Me If You Can, but offers relatively little in comparison when it comes to character and pacing.