Una donna, una storia vera

Its fuuny how time changes how you see a movie. If this film came out in the cinemas today it would look terrific compared to the current rubbish around.

The premise for Marie is a god one for a thriller and although the script bottoms out, great acting in almost all areas and powerful direction from Roger Donaldson save it from mediocrity and turn it into a really effective, attention grabbing, suspensful and emotionally involving film.

Apart from Roger Donaldson and Chris Menges moody atmosphereic lighting. The film is served best by Sissy Spaceks lead performance, if any actress had greater ability to allow you to feel how their character is feeling I'd like to know who it is. Sissy makes a great protagonist with a mixture of vunerability and strong resolve. She's not so headstrong as too seem a bitchy self-interested character, yet she has enough strength and integrity to make Marie the hero of the story.

I thought the whole production was great. And the fact that this film wasnt one of the best ones whe it came out just goes to show how far behind hollywood has gotten.

On a last note. Jeff Daniels played a great role in this. He really made you see him in a completely different light to normal.

In case you've never heard of Marie Ragghianti, she escaped an abusive marriage and went to work for a firm, only to discover some unsavory things about it. In the movie "Marie", Sissy Spacek plays her as well as can be expected. However, I would agree with a previous reviewer that the movie sort of uses her as a conduit to tell the story, and otherwise seems incomplete.

But overall, they do a pretty good job showing how Marie was finally able to make something of herself, only to be faced with the dilemma of maintaining this position or blowing the whistle. Maybe not exactly a masterpiece, but certainly worth seeing. Also starring Jeff Daniels and Morgan Freeman.

Sissy Spacek plays Marie Ragghianti, a single mother of three who escapes her abusive husband in Georgia, moves back to Tennessee and her mother, and gets her degree. After getting her degree, she meets old college friend Eddie Sisk (Jeff Daniels), an appointee of the new Governor, and he gets her a job in the clemency and extradition bureau. She does her job well enough that Gov. Blanton (Don Hood) eventually appoints her to the parole board. On the parole board, however, she learns there may be high-level corruption going on, with paroles and pardons being sold, as well as delays in extraditions. At every turn she's stymied, until the governor fires her. She sues for wrongful dismissal, hiring former Senate Watergate counsel Fred Thompson (playing himself). Also in the cast are Keith Szarabajka as the civil servant trying to win Marie's heart; and Morgan Freeman as a fellow Parole Board officer who not only isn't impossibly virtuous, but is in fact a bit of a bad guy.

The performances are good, especially Spacek's, and the trial scenes are particularly good, as there's little of the histrionics that generally appear in Hollywood courtrooms. In fact, the courtroom itself is pretty cramped and much less majestic-looking than in most movies. The movie is generally based on a true story, although I do wonder how much liberty was taken with that story since Ragghianti has to go through so much that it gets ridiculous by the end. The other problem with the movie is the heavy-handed music score, which makes it very obvious when Something Dramatic Is About to Happen. It was to the point that I started laughing when I heard the change in music. Still, don't let that put you off the movie. It is a solid film.

This was a great thriller, and is especially timely today, with all the corruption and lawbreaking at the top of government,

But I disagree with Michael Morrison when he says that Ray Blanton ended his governorship the way President Clinton ended his presidency. I've seen the movie twice, and have researched Blanton. The truth is, Blanton was a very corrupt official who did very little for his constituents and did not care about upholding the law or about the people who elected him. Unless everything I've read about Blanton, and saw in the film, was incorrect, Mr. Morrison is wrong. The truth is, Blanton left office in disgrace, with a dismal record as governor. Among those who remember him, he holds very little respect. In fact, even though The Tennessee State Constitution was amended in 1978 to allow Blanton and future Tennessee governors to succeed themselves. he did not run for reelection. In fact, due to the controversy surrounding his administration and lack of respect the public felt about him, it was very unlikely he would have been renominated, let alone reelected, had he chosen to run.

So Mr. Morrison observations are 180 degrees wrong.

As far as the movie, itself, is concerned, the story is strong. I was actually getting hot under the collar watching the corruption going on, even though it was only a movie. Spissy Spacek's performance as Marie Ragghianti made me genuinely feel the frustration of being in a position where she has to choose between siding with the law and your citizens or siding with a corrupt government official (who will abuse his power and authority in order to put you down if you don't join his side). This is true testimony to her acting skills.

Fred Thompson plays himself in this film; a skillful performance which led to his eventual full-time career as an actor. As a real life politician, himself, he skillfully is able to draw on his personal experience to bring certain depth to both his role here and subsequent acting roles he carried.

Although the situation in Tennesee, back in the 1970s, doesn't come close to the level of corruption today, at the Federal level, it does serve as an excellent morality tale of what can and, indeed, has happened. It's a bite size version of the bigger story that is going on today.

Uninteresting vehicle for Sissy Spacek, an adaptation of the book "Marie: A True Story" by Peter Maas (the biographer of Frank Serpico), concerns divorced single mother Marie Ragghianti, who was fired from her job as chairman of the Tennessee Board of Pardons and Paroles in 1977 after refusing to release certain convicts (all rotten and threatening for effect) whose pardons were the result of bribes going back to the governor (similarly rotten). Ragghianti sees the corruption, understands its origins, and is tempted to go along with it for the sake of her job, but eventually has to take a stand for justice. Sally Field's Oscar-winning performance in 1979's "Norma Rae" provided a much-needed boost for actresses looking for substantial roles in 1980s cinema; however, by 1985, audiences had cooled on female stars such as Spacek, Field, Jessica Lange and Meryl Streep all taking noble stances on-screen for the sake of audience empathy (and prestige). Nothing in "Marie" rings true, not Spacek's relationships with her co-workers, her troubles with doctors over her sick son, nor her humble beginnings as an undereducated and abused housewife (the actor playing Spacek's bad-tempered husband looks about 10 years younger than the actress). The writing is vapid, Francis Lai's music is 'heart tugging' in the worst sense, and Roger Donaldson's direction is scattershot, with artificial details dotting the scenario. Fred Thompson plays himself as Marie's attorney, and is the only cast member to successfully overcome the phony dramatics. ** from ****