Review of The Constant Gardener (2005) by Thomas W — 16 May 2010

A shockingly simple yet overtly complex suspense-thriller/murder mystery that stars a very-good Ralph Fiennes (even when playing ultimate evil [he is Voldemort!!!], when isn't he good?) and an Oscar-winning Rachel Weisz (she won for this very role although she has been one of my favorites for years).

The film is a blend of linear story-telling and flashback of emotionally-wrenching grit and drama from Brazilian filmmaker Fernando Meirelles (also see his film 'City of God'). The title character is British diplomat Fiennes who has morals and strict ethical standards that he follows EVERYday; but he is nearly silent in expressing his views so that he'll keep from offending anybody around him.

He meets and becomes smitten with an outspoken and worldly, young lawyer who very quickly falls in love with him -- either him or what he can provide for her and where he can send her ... or so he questions as he doesn't believe he has as much to offer her as she does him (the short of the love story is that she does love him and it just makes for dramatic tension as he worries that she didn't marry him for love and she possibly has other lovers).

Weisz is a truth-seeking lawyer and bleeding-heart liberal (those dastardly, horrible things!!!) who finds out that a pharmaceutical company isn't the do-gooders they proclaim themselves to be. By using her husband's connections, she gets herself into some of the inner-political and inner-social circles of Kenya and makes enemies doing so as she is hellbent on exposing the truth of the powerful and vile company that is using African slum populations as guinea pigs to test their products (!!! even though this is a fictional story it is horrifyingly scary knowing that this could actually happen in the real world !!!).

The corporation's thinking is that the overly large population of voiceless Africans should be grateful for these possible remedies and their lives are so meaningless and "cheap" (yes ..

. cheap!!!!) that their deaths won't really matter (it is better that an African die from a myriad of uncertain/untested/unproven drugs than a white person -- no?). On the eve of exposing this, Weisz is murdered and Fiennes is left with a giant question as to why or how it all happened.

This isn't a surprise/spoiler as finding her murderer is the plot/premise of the entire movie and her death is revealed in the movie's opening, its advertising and and its preview/trailer. The depth of the lies and deception, the cover-up, the lack of guilt and the appalling disregard of "cheap" lives is the story of The Constant Gardener.