| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
BaftaBaby 
"Always entranced by cinema."
|
 Posted - 12/18/2008 : 12:27:05
|
Doubt
It's 1964 and the Bronx, like the rest of America and much of the West, is changing almost daily. And if there's one metaphoric scene that draws the path from wartime austerity, through the stolid reconsolidation of the 1950, just encroaching on the enlightment of the '60s - it's the one between Viola Davis and Meryl Streep. Davis is Mrs Miller, mother of the first and only black child at the St Nicolas Catholic school whose principal is Streep's Sister Aloysius - a complex woman as capable of protecting one of her elderly nuns who's going blind as she is to embark on a campaign to oust the school's priest, the all-too human Father Flynn [another powerful and intelligent performance by Philip Seymour Hoffman].
That Streep is wonderful almost goes without saying. For contrast with her portrait of Donna Sheridan in Mamma Mia! this couldn't have been a braver choice. Davis is simply superb in that confrontational scene where the convicted yet irrational certainties of the past are called so powerfully, so humanly into question. And that's only one of the titular Doubts that invades nearly every scene.
John Patrick Shanley directs from his own stageplay; this directorial follow-up couldn't be further from his debut Joe Versus The Volcano some 18 years ago. His screenplay hasn't quite dusted off its theatrical cobwebs, and some of his shot choices come straight from Fritz Lang's M. Trouble is, Shanley's story neither contains nor warrants such tension to justify the distortions. And the rest of the film is too technically conventional to make them anything more than a gimmick.
Shanley borrows much from what is clearly a love of cinema - and he borrows from acclaimed masters like Hitchcock - note those high angles looking down counterpointed by Streep's frequent looking up for a guidance that seems to be getting fainter by the day, the way the weather joins the cast list of characters, the shots of background action - significant yet too hurried for us to be sure we've seen what we've seen and why it might matter. All this is good in theory, but it feels a bit clunky and almost unconnected. Like a series of patches, each making a statement, yet sewn together with strings of grass.
Shanley's direction is more craft than art. But he's had the presence and grace to surround himself with some really fine talent. Actors, yes, but also Roger Deakins [again] whose cinematography is rapidly landing him among the pantheon of the great ones, and editor Dylan Tichenor who got an Oscar nomination for last year's There Will Be Blood.
|
|
|
randall
"I like to watch."
|
Posted - 06/29/2009 : 12:35:11
|
I thought Streep hit only one note [very effectively, mind] until the very last line. Hoffman was so good that you tended to forget he was speaking from a script. The real brave one was Amy Adams, who stood toe to toe with them both and proved she isn't just a pretty face.
Since this is a play, I wasn't bothered by the playwright/director's failure to "open it up," and I didn't notice most of the show-off cinematography that you saw. It's refreshing to see a movie where the utterance of particular, carefully chosen words still matters. "Theatricality" can be partly washed away by the medium itself: i.e., you can get way up close and the actor can even whisper and still be understood. |
Edited by - randall on 06/29/2009 12:37:38 |
 |
|
|
Demisemicenturian 
"Four ever European"
|
Posted - 07/07/2009 : 00:47:24
|
Doubt
There was some discussion of it here, which is probably why there wasn't a separate thread before. |
|
|
|
silly 
"That rabbit's DYNAMITE."
|
Posted - 07/07/2009 : 18:55:51
|
I finally saw this last night, I think it was fabulous, for many of the reasons already mentioned.
I loved the pervasive doubt.
(trying to avoid spoilers here)
As for Streep's "one note," she kept reminding me of my mother-in-law, herself raised by nuns in Brookly after being orphaned at a young age. Same mannerisms, same 'the world is falling apart because nobody cares anymore' philosophy. The way she insisted she was Right (capitalized on purpose) simply because "I know people." And willing to stick to her guns no matter what anybody says.
There are still lots of people just like that, just read the comments on many newspaper stories posted online  They could have called the movie "Intolerance" but I think that may already be taken.
I also agree on Amy, what a great performance, never once did I think of Giselle  |
|
|
| |
Topic |
|
|
|
Doubt
