Tag Archives: Tom Wilkinson

2002, ★★★, Comedy

The Importance of Being Earnest (2002, Oliver Parker)

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Oliver Parker takes an interesting approach when it comes to adapting The Importance of Being Earnest from play to screen. He doesn’t worry much about opening up the film; at the beginning of the film, he showcases late nineteenth century London and later does quite a bit with Colin Firth’s country estate… but during the lengthy, dialogue-heavy scenes, he just lets the dialogue do its work.

The playfulness of the dialogue, the combination of sincerity and humor the cast imbues in it, makes Earnest seem open even when it’s closed. Tony Pierce-Roberts’s sumptuous photography and Charlie Mole’s playful music help quite a bit–and there are some distinct, memorable outdoor sequences (not to mention a singing montage). It’s quite an interesting adaptation.

Of the two male leads–Firth and Rupert Everett–Everett gets to have more fun. It’s appropriate, because of their love interests–Frances O’Connor for Firth and Reese Witherspoon for Everett–O’Connor gets to have more fun. It all balances out.

The film moves through a few phases, with the focus switching between Everett and Firth, before it becomes their dual effort to win back their love interests. That structure also allows for some nice scenes with O’Connor and Witherspoon. O’Connor and Everett are outstanding.

There’s some nice support from Judi Dench, Tom Wilkinson, Anna Massey and Edward Fox.

As the film winds down and the contrivances stack up, it does appear a little flimsy. Luckily, Parker saves some good jokes for the finale and recovers.

3/4★★★

CREDITS

Directed by Oliver Parker; screenplay by Parker, based on the play by Oscar Wilde; director of photography, Tony Pierce-Roberts; edited by Guy Bensley; music by Charlie Mole; production designer, Luciana Arrighi; produced by Barnaby Thompson; released by Miramax Films.

Starring Rupert Everett (Algy Moncrieff), Colin Firth (Jack Worthing), Frances O’Connor (Gwendolen Fairfax), Reese Witherspoon (Cecily Cardew), Judi Dench (Lady Augusta Bracknell), Tom Wilkinson (Dr. Chasuble), Anna Massey (Miss Prism) and Edward Fox (Lane).

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1996, Action/Adventure, ★★★

The Ghost and the Darkness (1996, Stephen Hopkins)

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There are two significant problems with The Ghost and the Darkness. Its other primary problem corrects itself over time.

The score–from Jerry Goldsmith–is awful (he basically repeats his terrible Congo score). It makes the film silly, like a commercial. A great deal of the film is about the wonderment of Africa, something Hopkins and cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond certainly capture… only to have Goldsmith ruin it.

Second, writer William Goldman thinks it needs narration. It doesn’t. Goldman’s able to get away with a dream sequence here (Hopkins and Val Kilmer sell it) but the narration’s too much. It brings the viewer out of the film, especially at the end; the credits are a disconnect from the film’s final narration.

The third problem is Michael Douglas. When he shows up, he’s basically doing Romancing the Stone, only with an occasional Southern accent. He gets better, but it takes about fifteen minutes and some of it is rough going.

The real draw–besides Hopkins and Zsigmond–is Kilmer (he never screws up his accent). He has an epic character arc in this film and his performance is brilliant. It’s especially interesting to see how he acts opposite Douglas, whose initially bombastic, silly presence should derail Kilmer’s performance. But it doesn’t. Again, some of it has to do with Hopkins, who knows how to shoot these scenes.

Good supporting turns from Tom Wilkinson, John Kani and Om Puri.

The film has some problems, but they don’t come close to overshadowing its achievements.

3/4★★★

CREDITS

Directed by Stephen Hopkins; written by William Goldman; director of photography, Vilmos Zsigmond; edited by Roger Bondelli, Robert Brown and Steve Mirkovich; music by Jerry Goldsmith; production designer, Stuart Wurtzel; produced by A. Kitman Ho and Gale Anne Hurd; released by Paramount Pictures.

Starring Val Kilmer (Col. John Henry Patterson), Michael Douglas (Charles Remington), Tom Wilkinson (Robert Beaumont), John Kani (Samuel), Bernard Hill (Dr. David Hawthorne), Brian McCardie (Angus Starling), Emily Mortimer (Helena Patterson) and Om Puri (Abdullah).

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1990, ★, Drama

Paper Mask (1990, Christopher Morahan)

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Until the third act, when it painfully changes course, Paper Mask is excellent. Hospital employee—it’s never clear his exact position—Paul McGann assumes the identity of his ex-girlfriend’s dead doctor boyfriend and heads off to practice medicine. The events don’t unfold as simply as that sentence suggests, but the process McGann goes through is what makes so much of Paper Mask excellent.

McGann’s performance (until the third act, when it becomes clear the film isn’t happy with the character’s arc unfolding naturally) is outstanding. It helps he has Amanda Donohoe as a love interest. Donohoe’s excellent in the film, grounding it. She disappears briefly and the whole thing falls apart.

What starts as a somewhat genre-less film—it’s got comedy, drama, mystery—ends as a completely traditional thriller. Well, maybe not completely traditional, but far more in common with the dangerous impersonator thriller than it should.

If I’ve given anything away, I can’t quite apologize because the film ends so pointlessly, there’s not really much reason to watch it as a drama. The acting is excellent and is worth a look (especially for Donohoe, who I think went on to Sci-Fi Channel movies).

Also, director Morahan is outstanding. He manages to keep the filmmaking quality high until the very last shot, which is when Richard Harvey’s otherwise good score sputters out too.

Great supporting turns from Barbara Leigh-Hunt and Frederick Treves… and a mediocre one from Tom Wilkinson.

Paper Mask is competent, but fatally unimaginative.

1/4★

CREDITS

Produced and directed by Christopher Morahan; screenplay by John Collee, based on his novel; director of photography, Nat Crosby; edited by Peter Coulson; music by Richard Harvey; production designer, Caroline Hanania; released by Enterprise Pictures Limited.

Starring Paul McGann (Matthew Harris), Amanda Donohoe (Christine Taylor), Frederick Treves (Dr. Mumford), Tom Wilkinson (Dr. Thorn), Barbara Leigh-Hunt (Celia Mumford), Jimmy Yuill (Alec Moran), Mark Lewis Jones (Dr. Lloyd), John Warnaby (Dr. Hammond), Alexandra Mathie (Beverley) and Oliver Ford Davies (Coroner).

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2008, Action/Adventure, ★★½

Valkyrie (2008, Bryan Singer)

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For Valkyrie to work, Bryan Singer needs to get–give or take–five minutes when the viewer isn’t entirely sure Adolf Hitler wasn’t assassinated. The entire premise of watching a film, a historically-based film, where the conclusion is well-known and suspending disbelief… he needs five minutes. Maybe the trick is casting Tom Cruise as a German. By the time the story gets around to needing the viewer to question whether or not Hitler is dead, he or she has already accepted Cruise. The biggest hurdle is over (who knows what Welles could have gotten away with in Touch of Evil, after everyone is buying Charlton Heston as a Mexican).

Valkyrie arrives following months of internet-fueled derision–from Singer as director to Cruise as German–and it does away with both concerns in the first scene. The language transition from German to English isn’t the best ever, but it’s fine. It acknowledges the situation of having an English language film about a bunch of German speakers. Cruise is solid from the open. As for Singer–he keeps out of the way. Singer’s direction is unobtrusive and perfectly measured–when he needs to emphasize an actor, he emphasizes the actor, same thing when he needs to emphasize a story development. At its core, both story-wise and star-wise, Valkyrie is one of those 1970s pictures with a lot of recognizable, good actors and a lead who maybe has seen better days. Charting Cruise’s career, it’s either a good sign or a bad sign in terms of his bankability, but it shows he’s still capable of doing a fine movie star turn.

The script–from Singer’s Usual Suspects writer McQuarrie and some other guy–does have a lot of twists and turns. It’s kind of like watching a chess game and knowing who’s going to win in advance. At some point, knowing the winner isn’t as interesting as seeing how the game is played. Valkyrie‘s not one of the best World War II films, but it gets a lot of mileage out of emulating them–I half expected an end credits actor showcase like The Great Escape. The only thing I couldn’t figure out about the script was the presence of Carice von Houten as Cruise’s wife. Sure, it’s historically accurate, but Cruise is the protagonist because of his role in the conspiracy, not because he’s necessarily the most interesting character.

It doesn’t hurt the film’s technically superior. Singer’s usual crew, cinematographer Newton Thomas Sigel, editor and composer John Ottman, these guys usually turn in good work.

Similarly, the all-star cast is excellent, particularly Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson and Terence Stamp. Kenneth Branagh and Eddie Izzard are fine in glorified cameos. Jamie Parker’s good as Cruise’s sidekick. All of the aforementioned anti-Hitler conspirators are played by Brits. The hero’s American. Given a point of Valkyrie is to identify some Germans as different from Hitler following stooges–the reality of a postwar Germany, excellently discussed in Tony Judt’s Postwar for example, reveals a far more depressing truth than a Hollywood movie would ever want to present–it’s kind of strange Singer casts a very German guy as a very big Nazi. You’d think he’d at least go for one major good guy. There’s one good guy played by a German, but he doesn’t come into the movie until real late.

Valkyrie‘s a solid, watchable thriller. Maybe even a little bit better than it should be. Singer has a couple excellent moments as a director, maybe the best stuff he’s done since The Usual Suspects. He actually gets sublime.

2.5/4★★½

CREDITS

Directed by Bryan Singer; written by Christopher McQuarrie and Nathan Alexander; director of photography, Newton Thomas Sigel; edited by John Ottman; music by Ottman; production designers, Lilly Kilvert, Patrick Lumb and Tom Meyer; produced by Singer, McQuarrie and Gilbert Adler; released by United Artists.

Starring Tom Cruise (Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg), Kenneth Branagh (Major-General Henning von Tresckow), Bill Nighy (General Friedrich Olbricht), Tom Wilkinson (General Friedrich Fromm), Carice van Houten (Nina von Stauffenberg), Thomas Kretschmann (Major Otto Ernst Remer), Terence Stamp (Ludwig Beck), Eddie Izzard (General Erich Fellgiebel), Kevin McNally (Dr. Carl Goerdeler), Christian Berkel (Colonel Mertz von Quirnheim) and Jamie Parker (Lieutenant Werner von Haeften).

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