(Rewatch) The Talented Mr. Ripley (a comparison)

 1999, d. Anthony Minghella - the binder

I've seen the Matt Damon-starring Ripley movie a few times, but I sussed out with Lady Kent that the last time I watched it was likely around 2006 or 2007 when we were still dating and I was still in that awesome  phase of "here's a thing I like that you haven't seen so we're going to watch this" that guys in new relationships go through.  So it's been some time.

Partway through watching Ripley on Netflix (a clear passion project from writer/director Steven Zaillian) I started to get the itch to rewatch the 1999 film again. My pop culture tourist brain gets that way, and I'm in full on "Ripley" mode in my brain right now (a re-subscription to the Criterion Channel is likely so I can watch Purple Noon and My American Friend, a couple early Ripley adaptations).

This isn't so much a review of the film, but a sort of comparison to the show, and my vague, vague memories of the novel.  

I will, however, state unreservedly that the film is great. It takes the Patricia Highsmith novel and distills it down to about 140 minutes both retaining much of the same spirit and structure of the novel while adding its own highlights which are definitely not unwelcome.

The biggest difference with Minghella's version is the addition of three new characters to the story. Somehow, even with their inclusion, they don't get in the way of anything, and in a few small respects help the film maintain its pacing and intrigue.  

The first new character we meet is Meredith played by Cate Blanchett (Elizabeth: The Golden Age). She's an upper-crust American who encounters Ripley at the landing port in Italy. Ripley, having already prepared to fake his way into the life of Dickie Greenleaf (Jude Law, The Young Pope), tells Meredith he is Dickie Greenleaf, likely figuring he would never see her again. I wonder if you can ever go wrong with Cate Blanchett, even creating a whole new character for a beloved property or story to slot her into. Like, if they made her Captain Kirk's estranged wife in the next Star Trek movie would anyone complain? Meredith comes back again once Tom has killed Dickie and tries to hide away in Rome. She's the consummate high society armpiece and seemingly a good egg to be around, but she just represents complication (Minghella speaks to how the relationship between Tom and Meredith is meant to mirror Dickie and Marge (Gwyneth Paltrow, Shallow Hal), and it does in a cracked mirror kind of way).  Tom lets Meredith down easy after a close encounter with Marge and Peter (Jack Davenport, Coupling), who we'll get to in a moment.  Meredith makes one last appearance, which we'll also get to in a moment.

The second new character is a real peripheral one, but Silvana (Stefania Rocca) lurks in the backgrounds of early scenes, her fetching short, mod haircut making her stand out.  She's Dickie's side-piece. In the story, traditionally, Dickie is with Maude quite committedly. They are a unit, but here, Silvana shows that Dickie has a more...free-flowing lifestyle, that he's not buckled down.  Silvana kills herself when Dickie rejects her (it's not until after we find out she was pregnant) and it wrecks Dickie, who starts to reexamine his life which means less time for Tom Ripley.

The third new character is the aforementioned Peter. He's a gay friend of Marge and Dickie who Tom meets originally at Dickie's place in Mongibello, but runs into again in Rome with Marge during intermission at the Opera (which Tom-as-Dickie is attending with Meredith). Peter's gaydar certainly pings wildly when he's around Tom.  Peter lives in Venice, so when Tom-as-Dickie finds the heat in Rome too much following Freddie Miles' murder, he returns to being Tom and starts building a life with Peter. 

Much how Tom-as-Dickie's relationship with Meredith is meant to be a cracked mirror of Dickie and Marge, Tom and Peter are yet another mirror. Being a mostly closeted gay man means having to pretend with Meredith, amid all the other pretending he is doing. Being Tom, and being open with Peter, about his sexuality at least, liberates Tom, except for his dark secrets which he can only allude to. But even as much as Tom and Peter mirror the other male-female relationships in the film, even more it holds a mirror up to the relationship between Tom and Dickie.

These new characters are all part of the nature of duality that Minghella is exploring in the movie, and the duality is layered. There's the duality of living in different class structures (Meredith speaks to the behaviour of those who grew up with money but try to shed the image that they care about it at all), and of course the duality of stealing someone else's life, and the duality of being a murderer, but then there's also Tom's sexual identity, of which, it's called out, homosexuality was illegal in Italy at that time the story takes place. Tom's not necessarily hiding his sexuality for criminal reasons, nor out of any sense of religious or social shame, he's really just trying to fit in to his surroundings, to be unnoticed wherever he is. Where the Tom Ripley of Zallion's TV series struggles with his ego, and having people recognize and praise and think well of Thomas Ripley, Matt Damon's Tom couldn't care less about protecting his name, he wants a lifestyle that he doesn't see any other way of achieving, but even more important to him is acceptance.

Silvana is a gateway to Dickie's dual nature, the guy who seems so carefree, nothing will tie him down. Jude Law's Dickie is into free jazz and free love and free time, he explores his passions at his whim without a lot of consideration for others. And yet, he's troubled by the spectre of commitment, to his family, to his girlfriend(s), to his friends, to what he should be giving back to the world for all that it has gainfully given him. Tom fits into his life so easily, because Tom wants that very free-wheeling life in the lap of luxury as well, so Dickie is happy to have a "yes man" to keep the good times going. It's Silvana's death, and the revelation that she was pregnant that causes him to reassess it all, to have his priorities flip. He commits to Marge and in doing so he needs to set his "yes man" free. And it gets him killed. Johnny Flynn's Dickie, in the Netflix show, is a lot more chill. He's not the radiant beacon of charisma that Law's Dickie is, nor is he as judgmental (Law's Dickie is mockingly cruel towards Tom on their first encounter), and rather than Jazz, it's art he's into. Flynn's Dickie is looking for something, something he can contribute to the world (writing and art clearly aren't it) and it's evident that, in both cases, the talents of one Mr. Ripley are greater than those of Dickie Greenleaf.. the difference is Flynn's Dickie is aware of it where Law's Dickie is not.

Peter is primarily a vehicle for exploring Ripley's sexuality. The book, if I remember correctly, doesn't keep it quiet but doesn't have the language to really explore it. Far more than I recalled, Minghella's script puts it right out in the open without being 1990's blunt about it. In Zallion's TV show, Andrew Scott's Ripley is far more taken with Dickie's lifestyle than Dickie himself. Becoming Dickie is a means to an end. In Minghella's version, Tom wants to be with Dickie, and if he can't then he will become him, as a consolation prize. Scott's Ripley is much more of a sociopath, while Damon's Ripley is much more emotionally driven.  Hence his relationship to Peter. It was as much sharing the lifestyle with Dickie that Minghella's Ripley loves, and so, with Peter, he's able to get the reciprocation that Dickie couldn't give him, and together they can share in the luxury in a way that it wasn't ever going to happen with Dickie.

Until the very end, a completely new story element devised by Minghella, where, on a cruise with Peter, Tom runs into Meredith. Meredith is kind of the last person who knows Tom as Dickie, and when they meet on the boat it's in a crowd of Meredith's family and peers. Tom is stuck. He cannot chuck her off the boat (as it's so evident in Minghella's direction that it's what he wants to do), it's far too exposed, but Peter...well, there's not really anyone else who knows they're together because of the very, very quiet lifestyle they're forced to lead. And so killing Peter is Tom's only out of this tense pickle.

One of my few complaints about 1999's The Talented Mr. Ripley is that Tom winds up coming off more like a serial killer than an opportunistic grifter. The intensity of his dispatching of Peter (which is wonderfully done in voice over while Tom sits with his regret) signifies much darker impulses than the more kick-your-heels-up ending where Tom kind of gets away with everything (Andrew) Scott free, with a pile of Dickie's money freely given to him by Dickie's father, and a brand new identity to travel the world, although Zallion's direction there hints at Tom resisting temptation to panic every time he sees a cop or constantly look over his shoulder.

There are a great many differences between the two productions, while still working within the same story housing... same number of rooms, just more guests. As noted in my prior review of Ripley, it's a very decompressed show, very methodical, patient. Minghella's ...Mr. Ripley is breathtakingly brisk, but in being so brisk there are quite a few bits of shorthand that, in comparison to Zallion's show, seem blunt, such as the opening narration from Tom (never to be repeated throughout the film) or the clunky way in which Tom tells Dickie that he's able to mimic people, copy their handwriting etc. (though it does lead to its own smart way of showing Dickie's acceptance).  The shorter runtime is actually more appreciated, but the depth and time spent in the longer production has its own rewards.

Minghella's film is very, very well directed, and it's not a bad looking movie by any means, but it looks like a jar of mustard exploded in a sandbox compared to the luscious black and white, the exceptional wardrobes and flawless lighting of Ripley. 

Marge, played by Dakota Fanning in the Netflix show, is pretty wildly different than in the 1999 film. Paltrow's Marge is immediately friendly to  Tom, and, in bringing Peter into the fray, Minghella speaks to Marge being an early ally to gay men. It seems like Damon's Tom and Paltrow's Marge are friends, something you never even get close to in the show. Fanning's Marge is immediately skeptical of Tom, leery even. She really dislikes him, and he dislikes her. But he tries to put himself in Dickie's headspace and fakes his friendliness.  Once Tom starts posing as Dickie is when Paltrow's Marge starts to doubt him. Fanning's Marge starts to become even more wary of Tom as he tries to juggle being both roles of Tom and Dickie.  But it's in the finale when things really deviate. Andrew Scott's Tom's has woven such an extensive web of lies, Fanning's Marge is completely caught up in it. Tom doesn't know if she's strong enough to break the web, but she is not, and eventually fully concedes to the lies about Dickie. Paltrow's Marge, in the end, is in hysterics, with not a fraction of a doubt about Tom's guilt in Dickie's disappearance, something Dickie's dad hand-waves away.  It's a very interesting inverse character arc for the same character in the same story that yields almost no different result.

There's obviously other differences, particularly in casting. Freddie Miles, as played in the Netflix show by gender-neutral actor/musician (and Sting's kid) Eliot Sumner and by Philip Seymour Hoffman in the film. Sumner carries Freddie with a quiet dignity and a defiantly wicked sense of style. Freddie is alluring and mysterious and attractive, and the plentiful queer vibes just radiate off them. Like with Peter in the film, Tom *should* be attracted to Freddie, but Scott's Ripley detests his very interloping presence.  Here's another man that has a relationship to Freddie and it makes Tom very, very jealous. Plus, Freddie seems to "see" Tom, and tests him with innocuous probing questions that discomfort Tom greatly.

Comparatively, in the film Hoffman's Freddie is a braggadocios American who just slides into Dickie's life and sucks all his attention away from Tom. Freddie, in Hoffman's hands, is the life of the party, but also the guy who sucks up all the energy in the room for himself. He is the epitome of the entitled asshole, and unlike Dickie or Meredith he has no reservations or distaste for his second-hand wealth. He seems like the kind of guy who would consume the whole world if it would give him a moment's pleasure.  Like his TV show counterpart, Hoffman's Freddie picks up on everything that is wrong about Tom and taunts him mercifully for it. He's not shy about it. Where Sumner's Freddie was discrete, Hoffman sees Tom as a parasite and wants to pop that tick right off Dickie's back. The big difference between the two is how with Sumner, you love his Freddie right away, and you don't share in Tom's view of him as a bad guy. His assessment of Tom as something unsavoury is just saying what we've been thinking all along. But Hoffman's Freddie...oh, you just want him dead, and Tom is more than happy to oblige.  Freddie's death in Ripley is a tragedy. His death in The Talented Mr. Ripley is a mercy on us all.

The last thing I'll say about this at this point is Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley has revealed itself as one of the great stories in fiction. Just between these two productions the vast differences in perceptions of the characters, their mindsets, their portrayals... it's a dark, tragic crime story that can be adapted over and over and over again and not feel the same way twice. I'm absolutely itching to get to Purple Moon and, in advance, I apologize for what will likely be a very similar post comparing the three productions.