QOTD

[randy_byers]

"So I was surprised and intrigued when I heard that Anthony Minghella was adapting the book for the big screen. How would he translate this tangled web of memory, dreams, and drug addiction to the big screen? The answer was to very delicately pick out the tragic love story woven through the book and place it front and center. It was certainly beautiful and well done, but it was not even close to the same experience as the book. The result was also, interestingly enough, a film that 100% of my male acquaintances consider the most horrifying, time-stopping, hellish chick flick experience of their lives. It is the hellish chick flick experience by which all others are judged. 'So how was Atonement?' 'Well, it was harsh, but it was no English Patient!'"

-- Kati Irons, Movie Review: The Fall - Tarsem Singh Gifts Us a Masterpiece

Comments

[hal-obrien.livejournal.com]

As I just commented:

"The result was also, interestingly enough, a film that 100% of my male acquaintances consider the most horrifying, time-stopping, hellish chick flick experience of their lives."

What an odd and limited circle of male acquaintances you must have. This says far more about them than about The English Patient.

*^*^*

Then again, I'm sufficiently radical that I don't think there is such a thing as a "chick flick." I don't think such movies are so widely appealing to women -- or so widely un-appealing to men -- to justify the term.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Well, what can I say, I found The English Patient excruciatingly high-minded, and I thought much the same of Atonement. And I like a lot of romantic films! But I actually thought she was making a joke at the expense of her male friends, and I guess I was the natural audience for it.

[hal-obrien.livejournal.com]

{thrum of fingers on desktop} But I am high-minded, Randy. Sheesh.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Well, I think the proper response is Dr. Frank-N-Furter's: "I didn't make him for you!"

[ron-drummond.livejournal.com]

I agree with Hal. And I actually really liked The English Patient at the time, though I haven't seen it since. Vonda McIntyre absolutely loathes the film, and though she has stated her concrete reasons for hating it at least twice in my hearing, it had been too long since I'd seen the film for me to make sense of her objections. I actually would like to get her take on it again, in writing if I can, just before rewatching it, or just after. I've always been puzzled by why so many people hate it.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Note that Katie Irons calls the film "beautiful and well done" herself, even as she notes that it's not the same experience as the book. (Her comments on the differences and how this links to The Fall are quite fascinating to me as well.)

It could be that some of the hatred for the movie is because of its popularity and awards (including Best Picture Oscar), although my memory is that I came out of the theater disliking it. I seem to recall that as well as disliking the literary high-mindedness of it, I also despised the two main characters (those played by Ralph Fiennes and Kristin Scott Thomas). I also seem to recall that I liked the Juliette Binoche character, on the other hand. Maybe I'll watch it again someday myself to see if I like it better the second time around.

[trinfaneb.livejournal.com]

I didn't hate "The English Patient," although I certainly have no desire to watch it again, unless its to admire Willem Dafoe and his thumbless performance.