Tempestade

"Tempest" is a somewhat self-indulgent, uneven, discursive movie. But as Lord Byron, another visitor to Greece, protested to his friend John Murray about his similarly self-indulgent and discursive "Don Juan," "It may be profligate but is it not life, is it not the thing?"

The connections to Shakespeare's "Tempest" may seem, as another commentator here claims, a bit tenuous. But watch the film again after re-reading "The Tempest," and they'll seem far closer. What makes this film flawed is its uneasy mixture of straightforward normal narrative and sudden jarring apparent improvisation, particularly between Cassavetes and Rowland. But to be honest, these scenes are the most remarkable and gripping in the film, if the hardest to watch.

The music of this film, composed by Stomu Yamashta, is also overlooked. Particularly fine is the perfect little piece played to accompany the afternoon siesta, as people, animals, and seemingly the entire island collapse to sleep away the hottest part of the afternoon. It's a sublime moment, and representative of the best aspect of this movie and the one thing that keeps it somewhat unified, the fact that (aside from extensive flashbacks and the very end) it is the story of one day on an island, from awakening to night.

Overall, I'd rather watch this film a hundred times than see some bombastic Hollywood piece of crap once. And in fact, I probably have watched it several dozen times. Most times, I see something I missed before.

(Confession: I'm biased. This was the second movie I took my Greek-American goddess wife to see.)

Trivia notes on this flick:

• It was Molly Ringwald's first movie, as well as Sam Robards';

• It was actually not filmed on an island, but in Gytheion, the southern tip of the remote Mani peninsula of the Peloponnesus of Greece;

• The (by today's standards) primitive special effects were done by Bran Ferren, who later became head of Disney Imagineering, and still later was an adviser to the US intelligence community;

• Paul Mazursky, the director, chose the title of his recent autobiography, "Show Me the Magic," from the script of "Tempest."

William Shakespeare probably didn't envision Stephanos as a gay doctor, Antonio as a faithless wife, or Caliban as a goatherd with a Trinitron, but the Bard's had worse done to his good work over time, and might even enjoy the sumptuous pageant of life that is his "Tempest" as re-configured by Paul Mazursky and co-writer Leon Capetanos.

This time, Prospero is Philip Dimitrius (John Cassevetes), a Manhattan-based architect tired of designing Atlantic City casinos for the amiable Mafioso Alonso (Vittorio Gassman), especially after discovering Alonso is carrying on an affair with Philip's wife Antonia (Gena Rowlands). Along with daughter Miranda (Molly Ringwald), Philip escapes to a remote Greek island with Miranda and his new mistress Aretha (Susan Sarandon), a nice Catholic girl who struggles with Philip's celibate lifestyle. Will a sudden storm bring all right in the end?

Here's a thought on the career of Cassevetes: How many other actors could make a film so confused into something so riveting? A darling of film critics for his earlier work, often with his real-life wife Rowlands, he presents a central character who really suffers for his art here, but seems to enjoy himself and makes us enjoy him, too. It's not Prospero, but something rich and strange that makes for a terrific sea change all his own.

"It's all here," he tells one of his faithful companions, Aretha's dog Nino. "Beauty, magic, inspiration, and serenity." That it is. "Tempest" transfers 1611 London to 1982 Manhattan and finds some nice resonances in Philip's displaced life. "Show me the magic", he calls out to a storm-tossed city skyscape, and Mazursky's version, augmented by Donald McAlpine's sterling cinematography of purple seascapes and naturally sun-burnished Greek landscapes, does just that.

It's not a perfect movie, by any means. In fact, the big finale, which is the only part of the movie that follows Shakespeare's storyline to any faithful extent, is a mess. Rowland's character is hard to care much for in this film, and after meeting Sarandon in all her braless glory, it's hard to understand Philip's continuing concern for his wife, let alone his left-field desire to make an unhappy "sacrifice" in order to restore the natural order of things.

But there's a lot to love about "Tempest". In addition to Cassavetes, there's Ringwald's film debut as his loyal but restless daughter, here as in the play an object of desire for the primitive rustic "Kalibanos" (Raul Julia). Ringwald here is very much the same teenaged muse of privileged adolescence that would inspire John Hughes, but with an emotional depth those later Hughes films didn't delve into. Ringwald and Julia never got any Oscar attention, but they both would win Golden Globes for their playful work here. He tries to woo her in her island isolation with his TV reruns of "Gunsmoke" in Greek, tempted by her 15-year-old body.

"I want to balonga you with my bonny johnny," Kalibanos declares, getting shoved aside but winning our sympathy anyway, especially after performing "New York, New York" with a chorus of goats. (When "Tempest" hit the screens, Julia was the toast of Broadway as the lead in "Nine".)

It's Mazursky's show, even if it feels at times that Cassavetes is running things with improvisational line readings and emotional breakdowns galore. (Philip introduces himself to Aretha by telling her "I'm right in the middle of a nervous breakdown".) He plays his character as an amiable obsessive, seeking to crystallize his happiness by building an theater in his otherwise uninhabited island.

Adding to the enjoyment is Gassman's rich performance as the other man, who is as completely amiable as Julia while telling a youth-obsessed Philip: "Boys don't have half as much fun as we have. They're nervous...and they make love in the back of an old sports car." Despite being overlong and pretentious in spots, like so many art films, "Tempest" is entertaining in its excesses and a trip very much like Shakespeare intended, even if his dreams didn't involve smoking pot backstage at a Go-Gos concert.

There are some nice elements here. Molly Ringwald (at 14, her first film), Susan Sarandon and Gena Rowlands all charm. The Greek scenery is nice but not particularly well exploited. Raul Julia and Sarandon steal every scene they are in, master actors.

But the writing is dreary, wandering all over the place. I'm very patient with meditative movies, but this just meanders. The Tempest connection is so very slight. All the elements, the main magic, that gives the play its power are ignored here and what we have instead is a tired midlife crisis plot, plus a petulant pubescence.

If you want a magical Greek coming of age tale built around a fragile love affair, read `The Magus.'

If you want an intelligent, magical adaptation of The Tempest that has intellectual and visual power, see `Prospero's Books.' Pass this one up unless you just want to experience these women in some comfortable performances.

I've rented this gem several times! It's a small, yet somehow sprawling masterpiece taking the viewer from Manhattan glitz to the beauty of the Greek islands. John Cassavetes on-screen marriage to his real-life wife Gena Rowlands is on the rocks. He finds meaning in a fling with footloose Susan Sarandon whom he finds in Greece while their daughter, played in her earliest film role by the pubescent Molly Ringwald, falls for the son of the Greek shipping tycoon who is courting her mother on a yacht sailing in neighboring waters. Meanwhile, the immensely talented Raul Julia plays a goatherd living in a cave with his Sony Trinitron. He has the "hots" for Molly Ringwald's character until confronted by John Cassavetes. All comes together at the end in a classic closing scene where all is reconciled. Raul Julia, the goatherd, is seen dancing with his goat. This film is full of mysticism, beauty, young and old love, humor, sexiness, and more. See it!

I've often heard people express disappointment that Mazursky's "Tempest" has little to do with Shakespeare's original. In my opinion, that is both true and false, but most of all, it's a bad starting point for offering critique. A work of art should never be criticised for what it isn't, but for what it is. The movie "Tempest" is nothing like a faithful rendition of the play, but to my mind, it is faithful to Shakespeare's work in spirit. What "Tempest" is, then, is perhaps one of the most successful experimental films of all time. No, not experimental as in hand- held camera and mumbled dialogue, but experimental as in exploring the convolutions of a story without undue regard for box office earnings. Mazursky's Tempest is epic, sad, realistic, joyous, full of life, but most of all, it is imaginative. Cassavetes portrayal of Philip/Prospero is in itself worth a 10/10 rating, and when you add Gena Rowlands, Susan Sarandon, a wonderfully deep Molly Ringwald, Raul Julia, the dialogue, the music and the exquisitely suggestive little tableaux scattered throughout the picture... I rest my case. One of the best movies of the 80's. Don't miss it.