The Talented Mr. Ripley

Patricia Highsmith's Tom Ripley gets a deluxe reincarnation here, merit of the talented Mr. Minghella. A sensational script adaptation, stunning Italian locations and an extraordinary supporting cast. Tom Ripley saw the light before, most memorably with the face of Alain Delon in another beautiful outing by the underrated Rene Clement. This time, the winning feature is the superbly tailored script that gets inside the heads of the characters giving us a full panoramic view of their privileges as well as their desolation. Tom Ripley, the amoral, becomes the tortured immoral here. Anthony Minghella gives him a conscience, a self-awareness giving the tale an extra chilling touch. Matt Damon's natural dullness works wonders here. This may be his best performance to date. But it is the supporting cast that makes "The Talented Mr. Ripley" fly so high. Jude Law as the spoiled, vain and ultimately cruel Dickie Greenlef is truly remarkable. His worthlessness, crystal clear for everyone to see, becomes irrelevant due to the astonishing charisma and oodles of sexiness that Jude Law exudes. That, in itself, makes Gwynneth Paltrow's character totally believable. She's an intelligent woman who must know Dickie for what he is but she puts that aside and we don't question it. Philip Seymour Hoffman's Freddie is a fully fleshed out character who's on the screen for a few minutes but leaves and indelible impression. Great fun to witness his two faces. Creepy and wonderful. But it is Cate Blanchett, in a creation worthy of W Somerset Maughan that becomes the icing on this scrumptious cake. I would love to see a film where her Meredith is the central character. This "Talented Mr. Ripley" cemented my film relationship with Anthony Minghella. I wait for his films with childish anticipation.

Duality -- the ability to be one person in a certain situation, and another in another -- is the underlying and pervading theme of "The Talented Mr. Ripley." It is a theme that sparks the central conflict of the picture, that influences each of the main character's decisions and actions. Each character in the film is either pretending to be something else, or playing directly to a superficial identity. The film unravels each of the character's motivations for doing so, and in so doing strips away the layers of reality we construct for ourselves. Characters either uncover the explicit duality of their lives (Cate Blanchette's willingness to admit that she travels under another name), or have it uncovered for them (Tom Ripley). When each character is laid bare, when each character is most fully themselves, when each character stops acting and pretending, they are undone.

The film presents a main character who does his best to pursue another life -- but he cannot ultimately follow through with it. We are trapped by who we are, aren't we? Gwyneth tries to become Dickie's ideal woman, to avoid asking him to settle down, but she cannot -- she wants the home and the family. This is her undoing -- she weeps in the film, "I must have pressured him". Dickie can't escape the fact that he loves the nightlife -- that he strays, that his attention only lasts as long as the diversion. He says he will marry Gwyneth, but we know that his eye can never stop roaming. This is his undoing. Dickie's pal -- superficially polite, while snide and arrogant at the same time -- is much smarter than he appears, which leads to his undoing as well. When each of the characters lets their guard down and becomes who they are, it destroys them. Each of the characters has a tragic flaw that they try to ignore, or play to, a flaw which undoes the perfect lives they all pursue.

The ironic twist is that Tom Ripley is the catalyst for all of this -- yet, his tragic flaw is that he has no flaw. While each of the main characters has an identity they are running from, Ripley HAS no identity to speak of. He starts out pretending, and he pretends through the entire film. Who IS Tom Ripley? Even Tom himself wants to know. One would think that this would enable him to become the perfect actor -- when you paint on a blank canvas, one would think you can paint anything. But even Tom, blank as he is, distills down to someone -- even if it is a blank canvas, a "real nobody." And it is not only himself he is unsure of -- it is the entire world around him. Among his first lines in the film is a line uttered while listening to a jazz record -- he mumbles to himself, "Can't tell if it's a woman or a man." It is this uncertainty that informs the world he sees, and how he relates to it. Is Tom gay or straight? Is he evil or good? Even Tom doesn't know.

The film points out that we cannot run from our own darker half. We are all tempted to become someone else -- anyone who has been made fun of in school, who has longed for the life of the rich and famous, can identify with this The enemy is not without, it is within. It is this same duality which haunted and tormented so many of Hitchock's characters, most notably (but not exclusively) Norman Bates in "Psycho." "The Talented Mr. Ripley" is a worthy heir to that film classic in its ability to get the audience to sympathize and empathize with Tom. We feel his love for Dickie Greenleaf -- we feel his frustration at being shut out of his life -- we feel the awkwardness of being trapped in a situation that was never intended. As we watched Marion Crane's car pause in the swamp and waited breathlessly, perversely hoping it would sink and allow Norman's mother to get away with murder, so too we watch Tom Ripley descend into darkness, and when the cops arrive at his hotel, we wait breathlessly with Tom, hoping he will get away.

Duality is present within us all... and while we are taught "to thine own self be true," in this film it is only when we are true to ourselves, that true pain comes.

A talented cast leads this twisted film about identity and becoming someone else. I enjoyed this movie quite a bit. It makes you think and lingers with you long after the credits roll. Anthony Minghella fills the screen with gorgeous European visuals that really add to the atmosphere. It is a tad long and takes a little bit to get going, but the Talented Mr. Ripley is another great film from 1999.

A small-scale imposter / con man, making the rounds in 1950s New York, gets caught up in something much greater than his usual scam and decides to let it ride, if just to see where he winds up. In this case the answer is Italy, gorgeous vestige of the old world with just a few hints of the modern one, where he's tasked with convincing a flippant trust funder to return from a perpetual, fortune-draining holiday. That mission quickly goes by the wayside, just as soon as he realizes how much easier life is in the lap of luxury, and he merely exacerbates said money-letting as the wealthy playboy's new wingman. When things take a turn for the messy, though, his welcome worn thin and nothing to show for it but bittersweet memories, a panicked string of responses sends the entire comfortable lifestyle into a tailspin. At its root, Ripley is an example of how fear and rejection can press a normally smart, affable person over the brink into monstrosity, a surprise considering the playful tone of the first act. Matt Damon, still fresh from his breakout in 1997's Good Will Hunting, shows great versatility in the leading role (essential for such a complicated character), smoothly masking that twitch in his eye from all but the viewing audience. It's one of those films where you'll feel wrong about your rooting interest, knowing all along that the guy absolutely does not deserve a happy ending, with the final moments serving as your comeuppance.

I was so fascinated by Tom Ripley's character that I watched this movie again and again. There was something about him that I felt sympathetic towards on one hand and gave me the creeps on the other. Sympathetic because in more than one ways he is like you and me. He wants to be rich, he wants approval and he is may be just an opportunist. Creepy because he latches on like a leech, he can't take rejection and though he doesn't plan but once he assumes the identity of someone else he can go to any extent to keep that. Actually one can identify with the character so much that it's almost scary to look inside your dark corners.

Matt Damon played this three-dimensional character so well that I almost became a huge fan of his. Jude Law as Dickie Greenleaf, whose identity Tom Ripley steals was very good as well. The movie is shot in Italy, moves at a leisurely speed and is very atmospheric. One of my all time favorite thrillers.