by Susan Ellis and Debbie Gilbert
It seems redundant by this point
to review Shine. Accolades have been heaped, prizes awarded, and
nominations given. But Shine deserves this attention, and it's a
film worth savoring.
Shine traces the life of David Helfgott, an Australian piano prodigy who suffers a breakdown just as his career is about to take off. Helfgott is introduced in a later phase of his life (played by Geoffrey Rush), standing in the pouring rain pestering the staff of a closed restaurant. He's madly sputtering nonsense, presenting himself as both charming and off-putting. The film then takes you back to how he got in this state.
Helfgott is shown as a quiet, serious boy (played at this age by Alex Rafalowicz) whose talents are shaped by his overbearing father Peter (Armin Mueller-Stahl). Peter has an intensely passionate relationship with the boy. He encourages him, urges him to win the competitions he enters him in, but then stymies his career by refusing to allow him to train in America. When he tells him, "I will always be there, forever and ever," it sounds like a threat.
The teenaged Helfgott (Noah Taylor) manages to escape by going to London. It's there, under his teacher Cecil Parkes (John Gielgud), that Helfgott attempts the legendary Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 or "Rach 3." Parkes warns Helfgott of the piece, "People get hurt," and in the film's most stunning scene, it proves to be his student's undoing.
Years later, Helfgott is a frantic, chain-smoking, grabbing mess. Everything that he kept in while under his father's thumb leaves him now in rapid mumbo-jumbo. His salvation comes when he meets a kind astrologer named Gillian (Lynn Redgrave) who manages to get at the heart of what he's been trying to express.
Shine, directed by Scott Hicks and written by Jan Sardi, is told in a tremendously caring fashion. Buoyed by the film's score (much of the music is performed by the real Helfgott) and touching performances all around (though Rush has gotten a tremendous amount of attention for this role, both Taylor and Mueller-Stahl deserve the same amount of praise), Shine hits a high note that resonates days after you've left the theatre.
-- Susan Ellis
REGARDLESS OF WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT actor/director Kenneth Branagh's work, you have to admire his courage and integrity. He was determined to produce a monumental four-hour version of Hamlet, not that he was foolish enough to believe it could ever make money, but because he felt that Shakespeare's greatest play deserved to be seen in its entirety. The result, which isn't perfect but succeeds about 90 percent of the time, is a gift to viewers and students everywhere, now and in the future.
The text of Hamlet is usually pared down to about two hours, leaving the impression that it's a soap opera about a dysfunctional family. The restored scenes allow us to see the play in a new light; it's actually a much larger drama about a kingdom on the brink of war. Director Branagh expands the scope, giving us spectacles not normally seen in Hamlet, such as Fortinbras' army storming the palace. The opulent palace itself becomes integral to the film, with its secret trap-doors and its dazzling hall of mirrors (two-way, for convenient spying), where much of the action takes place. To have filmed so many complex shots involving mirrors and never let the camera show up on screen is an impressive technical feat.
Of course, no measure of cinematic wizardry can disguise bad acting, and fortunately most of the cast are professionals capable of handling such difficult material. Cameos by Charlton Heston, Billy Crystal, and Robin Williams are enjoyable and not too distracting (though the same cannot be said for Jack Lemmon's appearance). Among the main players, Derek Jacobi is the standout; his performance as Claudius is a marvel of understatement, and if there were any justice in the world, he'd have received a Best Supporting Actor nomination. Kate Winslet plays Ophelia with weepy, lusty abandon, while Julie Christie's Gertrude is without passion or personality; she doesn't even seem to care much about Hamlet. But at least there's no hint of incest between Gertrude and her son. Most 20th-century stagings of the play have subscribed to the Oedipal interpretation, in which Hamlet does everything short of raping his mother. Shakespeare never intended such nonsense, and Branagh has wisely steered clear of it.
Branagh's own performance is the most problematic element of the film. He emotes well and speaks the lines superbly, yet somehow he never imbues Hamlet with a soul. This is odd, considering how thoroughly he's inhabited his other Shakespearean characters. But Branagh has his moments. He can be very moving, especially during his confrontation with Ophelia, and he's predictably silly in his dealing with Polonius and the hapless Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. He's at his best in the "To be or not to be" soliloquy, delivered to his own reflection in a mirror. Of all the actors who've attempted this famous scene, Branagh alone seems to really understand what he's doing. On the other hand, his worst misstep comes with the "How all occasions do inform against me" soliloquy, which he delivers melodramatically while standing alone on a frozen landscape, as the camera slowly pulls back until the lights come up for intermission. It's laughably reminiscent of Scarlett's "I'll never be hungry again" speech in Gone With the Wind. Branagh redeems himself, though, with a surprisingly athletic swordfight at the end.
Not everyone will be enthralled with the uncut Hamlet, and it will be a blessing when this film comes out on video. That way, you can fast-forward through the dull parts, if you choose -- or you can savor every word of this enduring play. For the first time, you'll have that option. -- Debbie Gilbert
ONE CAN ONLY IMAGINE WHAT Sling
Blade's writer/director/star Billy Bob Thorton had to eat before he
dreamed up this story.
Sling Blade follows Karl Childers (played by Thorton), a simple-minded small-town Arkansas man who's been set loose from the "nervous hospital" after being committed 25 years earlier for murdering his mother and her lover. On the day of his release, when a journalist asks Karl if he thinks he'll ever kill again, he says (I vote this one for the next "Show me the money" catchphrase), "I don't reckon I got no reason to kill nobody." Not at that point anyway.
After his release, Karl happens upon a boy named Frank (Lucas Black), who invites him to live with him and his mother. Frank wants an ally against his mother's boyfriend Doyle (Dwight Yoakam), a low-down loser who is just asking for it by bullying Frank, his mother's gay best friend Vaughan (John Ritter), and the slow-witted Karl.
Thorton, who is just excellent as the gravel-talking Karl, delves deeply into the heart of darkness, at times too deeply. It's a trait he's shown before in the very violent and very good One False Move, which he scripted and performed in. With Sling Blade, he seems too touched by the freakish characters of Flannery O'Connor. Of course, you get an early hint that things are going to be weird when director Jim Jarmusch sticks his white head out of the window of the Frostee Cream.
Despite its excesses, this is a true accomplishment for Thorton (he's been nominated for two Oscars -- Best Actor and Best Screenplay), and Sling Blade is the most original film showing today.
-- S.E.