Review of Far and Away (1992) by Glenn L — 31 May 2012
It has two strong points:
1. The warm flesh-tone cinematography by Mikael Solomon, a personal favorite DP of mine.
2. John Williams' whimsical Celtic-American score.
Beyond that there's nothing too memorable about it. This was back during the early 1990s apex of Tom Cruise'' Hollywood heartthrob career, before he grew interesting with age and eccentricity but also after his initial flare of unmanufactured charisma via Risky Business. In other words, this was Cruise at his most boring; Nicole Kidman fared no better. Clearly, the film was aiming for the Technicolored romantic epics of the 1940s and 50s. Ronnie's traffic cop direction was fitted to, and further maintained, a certain proper sensibility akin to said films or yore, but he lacked any real mise en scène invention, rendering little more than pat Hallmark/Kinkade imagery. The land race sequence looked good in 70mm, I suppose.
War Horse is just as shameless, but better, more finely detailed and more deeply felt.
This review of Far and Away (1992) was written by Glenn L on 31 May 2012.
Far and Away has generally received positive reviews.
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