I've made a mess of being Dickie Greenleaf, haven't I?
In 1960, Patricia Highsmith's novel The Talented Mr. Ripley was made into a film by French director René Clément and retitled Purple Noon. The film was a huge success and made an instant star out of Alain Delon. Four decades later, director Anthony Minghella adapted the novel afresh, not only restoring its original title, but also exploring certain areas -- like Ripley's latent homosexuality -- that were simply too taboo when the earlier film was made.
Matt Damon stars as Ripley, whose talents (which include playing the piano in addition to forgery and impersonating other people) aren't exactly setting the world on fire when he takes advantage of a rich shipping magnate's offer to send him to Italy to coax the man's wayward son Dickie (Jude Law) into returning home to New York. When he gets to the village where Dickie is staying, though, Ripley becomes enamored of both his lifestyle and his girlfriend Marge (Gwyneth Paltrow) and quickly ingratiates himself into their lives. When the notoriously fickle Dickie tries to break things off with him, though, Ripley takes drastic measures and assumes his identity to ensure his continued comfort.
Complicating matters are socialite Meredith (Cate Blanchett), who already thinks Ripley is Dickie since that's how he first introduced himself to her, and playboy Freddie (Philip Seymour Hoffman), who sees through his charade, but things really come to a head when Dickie's father (James Rebhorn) arrives with a no-nonsense private detective (Philip Baker Hall) in tow. (This is on top of having the Italian police constantly breathing down his neck.) In the end, Clément wasn't allowed to let his protagonist get away scot-free, but Minghella makes it clear that while his Ripley may not get caught by the authorities, he's still going to be punished for his transgressions.
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
craigjclark) wrote,
