Everybody loves a really good -- and by really good, we mean really bad -- villain.
Sure, Psycho's Norman Bates had some Oedipal issues, but be honest, when Marion Crane's car finally glugged down into the swamp, we sighed with relief along with him. And while no one wants Silence Of The Lambs' Hannibal Lecter to have us for dinner, we still cheered when he got away.
Now, add a name to the list of movie madmen we love to hate: Tom Ripley, the wonderfully warped anti-hero of English Patient director Anthony Minghella's stylishly creepy psychological thriller The Talented Mr. Ripley. He's the most memorable movie bad boy since Hannibal and Norman -- and like them, all he wanted was a little love.
Who can blame him? When we meet Tom (Matt Damon, his aw-shucks features pinched behind horn-rims), he's a lonely, uptight, classical pianist stuck at the bottom -- literally -- in a basement flat in late '50s New York City. But beneath those Clark Kent specs lurk Ripley's super powers: Mimicry, forgery and the golden tongue of a con man. So when a shipping magnate mistakes him for a classmate of his black-sheep son, Tom plays along -- especially when pop offers a job: Go to Europe (all expenses paid, of course, dear boy) and bring the wayward lad home.
Cut to Italy, where Tom meets his quarry -- and his match -- in Dickie Greenleaf (Jude Law). The sax-playing hedonist is everything Tom wants to be: Handsome, rich, freewheeling, seductive. Soon, Tom is seduced by Dickie and his dolce vita of terrace brunches, lazy days boating with his devoted fiancee Marge (Gwyneth Paltrow) and late nights in smoky jazz clubs.
Eventually, Dickie's dad wises up, and Tom's gravy train hits the end of the line. And as his money runs out, so does shallow Dickie's interest. But when he tries to break things off, well, let's just say Tom goes a little crazy -- and soon, has to put all his nefarious talents to the test as he spins an ever-widening web of lies to keep his head above water.
Many critics have called Ripley one of the year's best movies, and with good reason. It's a likely Oscar-magnet. First for Minghella, who adapted Patricia Highsmith's novel -- she also wrote Strangers On A Train -- into the sort of thriller Hitchcock would make if he were around today. Think Vertigo in Venice: a heady mix of high style and basic instinct that pushes the cinematic envelope with daring situations, a smart story and an ending that isn't wrapped up with a bow.
Hitch surely would have approved of the casting. Law is decadently luminous as golden boy Dickie, Paltrow channels Grace Kelly as the icy-cool Marge, whose world slowly unravels; and the always-great Philip Seymour Hoffman all but steals the show as Dickie's playboy pal Freddy, the only one who sees through Tom from the start -- and pays for it.
Then, of course, there's Damon. Ripley is the biggest challenge and risk of his young career -- a disturbed, sexually ambiguous villain isn't great for teen heart-throb status. But his gamble pays off in his best work to date; a sensitive, intricately layered portrait of a desperate man who personifies the old saying about being careful what you wish for. Expect a Best Actor nod.
We're just sorry there isn't an Oscar for Best Villain.
(This film is rated AA)
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