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Pretty Good

Better Late Then Never

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

I haven't read Patricia Highsmith's novel on which this film is based but I gather from those who have that it's an excellent adaptation. I thought the acting was superb by the 3 main characters and the settings were great. The director made a few minor blunders on sailing the sailboat (I've owned and raced 10 sailboats over a 50 year span, one almost as large as the one in this film).But I'm also a clinical psychologist (retired) and I cannot imagine anyone being so consistently adept as Tom Ripley in faking so many things so, to me, the story was very unrealistic. However, since its plot apparently follows that in the novel very closely -- probably 10 of 10 stars worth -- it is a worthwhile film.

This modest French film from 1960 has dated quite badly compared to the nouvelle vague offerings that came out at the same time.The static camera work, elaborate sets and stilted, formal acting must have already seemed quite tired by the time it reached the cinema and the intervening years have not been kind. It feels, in many ways like a French attempt to do a Steve McQueen-style Hollywood film.Despite the dated style, this remains an effective character study of a sociopath. Delon's villain is amoral and lacking in any visible trace of compassion as he murders his friend and seeks to take control of his fortune only to be undone by his own arrogance and sloppiness. The transitions from playfulness to murderousness to fear are well-handled and one gains an insight into his shallow, greed-driven world.The bright colour photography unfortunately contrasts with the dark, brooding nature of the tale, further undermining the story.There is little innovation in the editing and the minor characters, such as the female love interest, are little more than ciphers.One cannot help but feel that this story, based on an American novel, has lost something in its transition between cultures. With better direction and a little more thought, this could have become a classic. Instead it feels like a strange dinosaur, caught between the old and the new.

Purple Noon (1960)It might be hard to see "Purple Noon" with the eyes of someone in 1960, when it was released, especially if you have seen the other famous movie based on the same book, the 1999 "The Talented Mr. Ripley." But in fact they are rather different films, even though a few scenes are quite similar. The more loosely filmed, less elegant, and rather clumsier "Purple Noon" is admired for exactly those qualities. It is not the 1999 highly (highly!) polished, superbly acted Anthony Minghella movie by any stretch, and yet, in most views, it is the better movie.But not to me. It's worth avoiding too much of that "which is better" comparison by remembering that the early film is distinctive as it spends much of its time as a kind of elevated mind game between to very good looking young men. They spar, they taunt, they find a kind of liberty and discovery in the ways they push each other to be something unexpected, even dangerous. This is developed in quick snippets as we go, but you get the sense of it more fully in a couple of longer scenes, and then eventually on the beautiful yacht where the crisis from their derring do comes to a head. Once Tom Ripley takes full control of his destiny, and Mr. Greenleaf's, we see that he is not, actually, the brilliantly deceptive and disarming Mr. Ripley in Minghella's film. That is, he isn't the "talented" Mr. Ripley at all, but a young man who barely avoids catastrophe time after time in his plot to take over Greenleaf's identity. He does succeed, to a point, but the constant dodges and role playing of Matt Damon's character are less the point here. This is more the picture of someone in slightly over his head.Alain Delon is certainly a pretty boy actor, a kind of cleaner, and more French, James Dean (who was already 5 years dead by this point). I can see how people prefer his version of Tom Ripley, because it's more likable the way any pretty rebellious and slightly dangerous boy is likable. In a way, I admire Damon simply because he wasn't such a paradigm. His flaws showed. It's Jude Law in the later film who is the pretty boy, playing Mr. Greenleaf, and in the earlier French version we have Maurice Ronet, who at least has the advantage of looking a lot like Delon.There are some weird flaws in "Purple Noon." One I couldn't accept at all was when Ripley calls Greenleaf's girlfriend, Marge, pretending to be Greenleaf, and Marge can't tell the difference. There are also touches in the later film that add to the complexity of it all--the addition of another woman, the greater presence of Freddy Miles (played in both movies by rather similar men), and the inner struggles of Ripley. Further, there is an authenticity to the American (later) film for the unavoidable reason that the characters are Americans in Europe, which they are (though Jude Law is British, a small point). In "Purple Noon" the characters are still American, with American names and histories and passports, but of course the look, act, and sound like they are French. Understandable, but odd in some larger view. There is also a wonderful sexual undercurrent in the later film missing in the first--the idea that Ripley is homosexual and doesn't know how to access those feelings, or how to come out to Greenleaf about it.Both films are beautifully filmed, this one far more simply, lacking the huge resources of Minghella's enterprise. That makes "Purple Noon" more gritty at times, and if it sometimes seems to cut corners (the market scene as the same woman in a blue dress in the background too many times), it is also more direct and less lofty, which is good in its own way. Jazz makes a brief appearance here, but nothing like in Minghella's version, where you might say the music takes over too much at times from the plot. "Purple Noon" does not, except for one short stretch on the yacht, dwell on atmospherics for their own sake.Rene Clement is certainly a celebrated French director, a generation before their amazing "New Wave" era. This is one of his lesser known features, but it has been getting closer attention in recent years, and you might really enjoy it. If you've seen the Damon/Law version of the two main characters here in action, you should enjoy the contrast of Delon/Ronet in the same roles. Very impressive, and different.

I'll bet that many fans of Anthony Minghella's excellent The Talented Mr. Ripley never watched René Clément's Purple Noon, the first cinematic adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's novel. That's a pity because, even though this French movie hasn't stolen one iota of the love I have lavished upon Minghella's version over the years, it is a remarkable exercise in growing suspense and tension.The film opens in Italy, and Tom and Philippe (not Dickie) have been having fun together for some time now, squandering the money of Philippe's father, who hired Tom to take him back to the USA. The story opens clumsily and thrusts the viewer into the middle of the action without any preambles, unlike Minghella's version. Philippe is getting tired of Tom, who's dressing up in his clothes and imitating him in front of mirrors, and Tom is realising he won't persuade Philippe to return to the USA and collect his father's reward. He's also falling in love with Philippe's girlfriend, Marge. So Tom decides to kill him.The murder, one of the highlights of the movie, happens in one of my favourite settings: in a yacht in open sea, away from civilisation and witnesses. It's a setting that several directors have exploited, from Roman Polanski to Claude Chabrol to Phillip Noyce. Few situations invoke tension and fear like the illusive peacefulness of the sea because, as Clémént shows, nature doesn't choose sides and can quickly become an obstacle to a well-planned murder.Alain Delon, younger than I've ever seen him in a movie, plays Tom Ripley. He plays the famous sociopath with ruthlessness and premeditation, hiding his emotions, if he has any, under an ice-cold look that is Delon's trademark. He delivers a fine performance, but his Ripley is not perfect. In the novel the villain seek to erase his identity and become someone else, someone of a better social class. The movie eschews the study of identity and class differences and makes Ripley a more traditional murderer, who kills a man for money and for a girl.The character of Marge (Marie Laforêt) gives to the movie little other than her beauty and a reason to pit between Tom against Philippe. I, however, prefer Tom in love with himself, a narcissist who doesn't need others. And Laforêt doesn't come close to Gwyneth Paltrow in Minghella's version, who shows intuition and backbone.Maurice Ronet, however, is perfect in the role of Philippe (he's also a dead ringer of Jude Law). Half school bully, half bon vivant, the playboy side of the character is captured by Ronet with ease, although Philippe is so insensitive, it's difficult at times to have sympathy for him.Purple Noon is beautiful to look at and not just because Clément is filming in picturesque Italian cities by the sea. The cinematography is in the hands of Henri Decaë, who's lent his talent to filmmakers like Jean-Pierre Melville, Louis Malle and François Truffaut. Although the screenplay doesn't seem too interested in the question of identity, the camera, through its countless games with mirrors and reflections, tries to force the novel's main theme back into the movie.The movie is very suspenseful, even for those who think they know the story. Clément takes enough liberties with the novel to make the story fresh. Tom's main problem continues to be juggling the privileges his new identity gives him with remaining anonymous, a difficult task when he's impersonating the son of a rich man.I've always loved films that show the perspective of killers and social outcasts. Between seeing a detective investigating and seeing a killer using his wits to remain free, I prefer the latter. There's nothing more thrilling and fascinating than being privy to a killer's mind for a couple of hours. What can we ask of fiction other than what we can't get from daily life? That's what Purple Noon is: a little outing from normal life into the life of a sociopath, told without regrets and empathy, like Tom Ripley.