Rating: 
Summary: Effective Old Fashioned Thriller
Review: I detested the sappy "The English Patient", but director Anthony Minghella has redeemed himself in my eyes with the taunt and creepy thriller, "The Talented Mr. Ripley." Matt Damon is quite effective, I think, as the covetous Ripley, a man who has no identity or personality of his own to speak of, and is also a closeted homosexual. In a case of mistaken identity (and blatant opportunism on his part) Ripley lucks into a job offered by the very rich Mr. Greenleaf to go to Italy and retrieve his wayward son, Dickie (effectively played by the gorgeous Jude Law.) Dickie, however, plans to stay in country and marry his handsome girlfriend Marge Sherwood(Gwyneth Paltrow.) Dickie and his lifestyle is so seductive, that Ripley plans to inject himself permanently into it, rather than return with the prodigal to the States, with sinister and tragic results. The Italian coastline is breathtaking. Matt Damon, Jude law, and the always watch able Philip Seymour Hoffman register well in their roles. Gwyneth Paltrow has little to do, but is perfectly cast as Dickie's thoroughbred girlfriend. Lovely Cate Blanchett has a small, but pivotal roll. The ending of this movie is creepy and effective in the extreme, as Ripley pays for his sins in an extremely painful personal way (even as he eludes the legal ramifications of his acts.)
Rating:
Summary: Entertaining and Stylish
Review: I admit, I came to this video with low expectations. Everyone I know who saw it did not like it. After watching the video, I really don't know why. This is a sleek, stylish movie that is very well made with terrific actors. Matt Damon is always wonderful, but Jude Law, he is fantastic. His Dickie is fascinating and you will feel about him the way Tom Ripley does. Tom is addicted to him, knows he is bad, but cannot escape. Ultimately, however, it is Tom who is truly bad. He's not really a sympathetic character, but for some reason, I found myself rooting for him. I didn't want him to get caught for all of his murders. This is a very well done, terridically acted movie that I think most people would enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: OTHER THAN I THINK IT WAS TOO LONG....
Review: I REALLY ENJOYED THIS MOVIE. Its usually easy for me to predict the ending of suspense/thriller movies and i didnt have a clue how this would end...so this was a big plus for me. On the other hand the end made kinda no sense to me so maybe thats why i didnt guess it... in any case. the scenery was great. the separateness of classes is made abundantly clear...disturbingly clear in fact. jude law was great as the spoiled rich object of obsession/affection and his friend (cant remeber the actors name) was so amazingly snobbishly on-point! he was great... hated him! marge character was kinda lame though... the power here was in the increasing obsession of matt damon. he appears normal in the beginning and than spirals downward as he begins to lose all he has gained..its quite a portrait of madness.
Rating: 
Summary: The Talented Mr. Damon
Review: "Mr Ripley" was, to my way of thinking, the best film made last year. Several critics dismissed it as shallow, drawn-out, and unbelieveable. I disagree. The film covers and takes us to the darkest corners of the human psyche--and it doesn't hold our hand the whole way through. Sure it's disturbing. Sure it's unsettling. Sure it's upsetting. But it's about charecters so unsettling and upsetting to begin with that it only makes the film darkly realistic and creepy. Leading this talented cast is Matt Damon, as the impoverished and disturbed protagonist. His charecter is a man who is envious, unhappy, and secretly gay. These are hinted at subtley and that's how it should be. But he covers such a wide range of emotions throughout the film that we can't decide whether to despise Ripley or cheer for him. His final position--trapped inside the monster he's made out of himself--is one of such helpless dispair that we pity him in spite of ourselves. Jude Law is wonderful as the arrogant, rich, and doomed golden boy who Ripley is assigned to ship home. His seemingly simple charecter is remarkably deep, thanks to Law. Phillip Seymour Hoffmann and Cate Blanchett do wonders with smaller parts, and it's shame we see them more then Gwyneth Paltrow as Dickie's naive, whiny girlfriend, Marge. It's a grim and bold movie, but hey, no guts, no glory.
Rating: 
Summary: I paid for this?
Review: I love movies and almost all movies - regardless of plot - have some redeeming characteristics. Not so with "The Talented Mr. Ripley". This was long, boring and predictable. In "horror" movies (Halloween 25) you expect people to make dumb decisions. ("Don't go in the garage!") But Mr. Ripley isn't so much talented as everyone he comes across is just, well, not very bright and it drags on and on. I suggest you pass on this one.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Long and Too Uppity
Review: What do you get when you cross a Merchant and Ivory Film with the typical hollywood serial killer flick? You get the Talented Mr. Ripley. The two do not mix well.Filled with great actors and wonderful scenery the film is too long and too talky. I think they tried very hard to make a "sophisticated" thriller and I they DID NOT pull it off successfully. Interesting at times, the film is ultimately too long with long streches of no real action. The DVD has some cool extra features but in the end I do not recommend owning this one. It is worth a rental if nothing else is in, but certainly not worth buying and watching again.
Rating: 
Summary: The American Patient....in Italy.
Review: Hollywood seems obsessed with the identity crisis of late. First was Keanu Reeves' reality check in "The Matrix", followed by the unforgettably good final 10 minutes of "Fight Club", thereafter came Kevin Spacey's adolescent flashback in "American Beauty", and now "The Talented Mr. Ripley". Anthony Minghella's lavishly crafted follow-up to "The English Patient" is billed as a sleek thriller, but unfortunately doesn't start delivering any thrills until the first 30-40 minutes of lush cinematography, beautiful attention to location, flirtatious jazz and masterful period detail has run its course. Other than this, not a lot happens. We get very little info about Matt Damon's character or background, just some beautiful scenery and masterful photography. The story goes like this: Tom Ripley (Damon) is mistaken for a Princeton student (having borrowed a jacket from a friend) and befriended by a tycoon who sends him to Italy on the basis that he can bring his carefree, Paltrow-engaged playboy son home (Law). They swiftly become friends but, after a bitter feud on a boat, Damon kills him and embarks on a swift identity change, adopting the facets of his victim. Hereafter, it becomes a question at each turn of "How's he going to get away with this?" and things start getting interesting. A slow-paced, albeit efficient thriller that seems more concerned with cinematic showing-off than any of the other factors that make movies interesting. A shame. There are ideas here that could have been so much more fully explored had they not been weighed down by such self-indulgence. Rest assured, it's not the work of art critics claim it to be.
Rating:
Summary: Split personality--or no personality?
Review: I like good psychodramas, and this is one of the few I've seen that's even remotely accurate in the psychological aspect. Beyond that, I thought it was a very well done film. I will admit, I'm not a big Paltrow fan--but Jude Law, especially, was fantastic.
Rating:
Summary: Read the book instead!
Review: This movie was such a poor adaption of Patricia Highsmith's fine and chilling novel, that it's laughable! The characters in the screenplay have none of the complexities in the novel; rather, they are all two dimensional, shallow and boring. I found that I did not care what happened to these characters, where I couldn't put the book down. The reason I gave it two stars, rather than one was because the filming was beautiful. Take my advice, spend the money on the novel, don't waste it on this film!
Rating:
Summary: Psychologically bone chilling.
Review: This movie made me wonder if I really did want to be someone else, and how far I would go to assume an identity. Matt Damon is Tom Ripley, who is sent to 1950s Italy to retrieve a millionaire's lazy son and his fiancee. Ripley is enamored with the lifestyle of Dickie Greenleaf, so he decides to kill him and assume his identity. Matt Damon took a refreshing step with this movie, which made me see him as a real actor, rather than a "heartthrob" puppet. The cinematography is excellent, and the Italian locales are beautiful. I hear it's based on a book, so maybe I'll read that and see how it relates to the movie. It's not a typical suspense thriller, but it does scare you because it makes you think about identity.
|
