Review of The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999) by Filipeneto — 06 Nov 2021

This film completely lived up to my expectations, having proved to be an authentic essay on vanity, hypocrisy, human falsehood. Based on a novel, the film brings to cinema again material that had already given rise to at least one film, in the 60s. It is, however, more than a mere remake, not making any kind of allusion to this film, which only real moviegoers will probably remember now.

The script is simple to summarize, but any idea of a simplistic, easy or light story is, in my view, a great illusion: the film is far denser, psychologically rich and nuanced than this brief synopsis might imply. Tom Ripley, a young man of modest origins, will ingratiate himself with Mr. Greenleaf, an American shipbuilding industrialist who will quickly "hire" him to go to Italy and convince his son, Dickie, to come back and take over his place in their business. It turns out that Dickie, living hedonistic and carefree on the Italian coast, beside a beautiful woman and at his father's expense, surrounded by friends, amusements and pleasures, wants everything except to return to New York... and Ripley decides to stay too. But Ripley's envy may take him further, as the differences and incompatibilities between them grow, as does Ripley's desire to have his new friend's life.

In fact, how much can we envy someone? Ripley goes to the extreme, nullifying her own self to completely embody the envied person, becoming that same person. As he says, "I'd rather be a fake somebody than a complete nobody". Of course, anyone could claim that the film's situation would be untenable in the long run for Ripley, with the lie coming to the fore as everyone who really knew Dickie came up and questioned his apparent disappearance... there's also, in both characters, a kind of latent homosexuality, repressed by both sides, which thickens much more their complex psychology.

In addition to a good story and an excellent construction of characters and script, the film offers us an extraordinary cast. Of course, by the nature of their characters, Matt Damon and Jude Law deserve all the attention. Damon is excellent in the restrained, obsessive and cold way in which he embodied the character, but it is Law who really enchanted me, giving us one of the best works of his career: he gives his character his own charisma and an enormous passion for life that goes beyond any rich-boy hedonism. In addition to them, the film features a satisfactory, albeit faded, participation by Gwyneth Paltrow, Cate Blanchett (very poorly used and hardly ever shown) and also Philip Seymour Hoffman, for whom the script reserves a particularly caricatured role, associated with bohemian life and a certain elegant loitering.

On a technical level, the film has several elements of interest, starting with a very good and elegant cinematography, with good colors, good light, and the intelligent use of the beauty of the Mediterranean landscapes where the film was shot. In fact, the film manages to make even us, the audience, wish for ourselves the carefree life of sun, sea and music that Dickie Greenleaf chose for himself, and understand very well how Ripley allowed herself to be seduced and fascinated by it all... of course, none of us would do what he ended up doing, but we almost supported the character. The film is set in the 50s, and gives us a smell of that time and that environment through clothes, cars and other props, such as the simple fact that almost everyone smokes, a habit still considered elegant at that time. Jazz is an almost ubiquitous element in the film and the soundtrack makes good use of it, but I regret that the film has not also known how to take advantage of some of the best Italian songs... I remember that the Italian song of the 50s and 60s is considered by many to be the best of music in this country, with names like Emílio Pericoli, Mina Mazzini or Ornella Vanoni, to name a few.