"A Map of the World" affords Sigourney Weaver the opportunity to trace the emotional and spiritual near destruction of an independently minded woman. Her fall from grace is so cruel and downright Biblical in the breathtaking chain of tragic events as to play like a female version of the story of Job.
The subject matter necessarily will limit audiences to those willing to sit still for a harrowing journey to hell and back.
"Map" concerns the victimization of a woman who doesn't live up to her community's expectations. When tragedy befalls a woman who dares to speak her mind and paint her barn blue, the citizens of a Midwestern town turn on her with such self-righteous fury as to befuddle any reasonable viewer.
There's more than a little exaggeration here. Indeed, the feminist viewpoint is so overstated as to tear the dramatic fabric of the movie itself.
Weaver's Alice Goodwin is seen as a good, caring mother who holds down a part-time job as school nurse while helping her husband Howard David Strathairn) run the family farm. She does, however, speak her mind.
While baby-sitting her best friends' children, she is momentarily distracted and the youngest child accidentally drowns. The community swiftly condemns her, first with angry whispers and sullen stares. And when the tragedy encourages a naughty boy's mother (Chloe Sevigny) to bring bogus charges of child abuse against Alice, the entire town instantly rises up against her.
She's jailed and her financially struggling husband cannot raise the bail that is set staggeringly high. Her fellow inmates taunt her unmercifully, and even Howard doubts her.
It gets worse, but what is most troubling is that Alice seems to enjoy her victimization. What Weaver and first-time director Scott Elliott fail to make clear is whether this aberration is the result of a mental breakdown or simply Alice's way to cope with an impossible situation.
For that matter, everyone's behavior is curious. Why is Howard so insensitive? Why do all of Alice's friends and colleagues turn against her on such flimsy evidence? Why does the child's mother even bother with the false charge?
The answer to all these questions is that the film, adapted by Peter Hedges and Polly Platt from Jane Hamilton's novel, wants to make a point. Society goes out of its way to punish independent women, and the filmmakers apparently feel no obligation to make any of this plausible.
Weaver's performance is certainly never dull, but she fails to let us inside her character. We're never certain what motivates her.
Strathairn has been handed a loaded deck with this role: The filmmakers were determined that the husband act the complete wimp throughout the ordeal. And Julianne Moore, as Alice's estranged best friend who finally comes to her rescue, has her puzzling moment too when she makes a pass at Alice's husband. Where did that come from?
The film, shot near this city where it had its premiere, is exceedingly well-made. But it becomes overbearing during those moments when it tries so hard to shock and disturb.
A MAP OF THE WORLD
Overseas Filmgroup
Producers: Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, Lisa Niedenthal
Director: Scott Elliott
Writers: Peter Hedges, Polly Platt
Based on the novel by: Jane Hamilton
Executive Producer: Willi Baer
Director of photography: Seamus McGarvey
Production designer: Richard Toyon
Music: Pat Metheny
Costume designer: Suzette Daigle
Editors: Craig McKay, Naomi Geraghty
Color/stereo
Cast:
Alice Goodwin: Sigourney Weaver
Theresa Collins: Julianne Moore
Howard Goodwin: David Strathairn
Paul Reverdy: Arliss Howard
Carole MacKessy: Chloe Sevigny
Nellie: Louise Fletcher
Running time -- 125 minutes
No MPAA rating...
The subject matter necessarily will limit audiences to those willing to sit still for a harrowing journey to hell and back.
"Map" concerns the victimization of a woman who doesn't live up to her community's expectations. When tragedy befalls a woman who dares to speak her mind and paint her barn blue, the citizens of a Midwestern town turn on her with such self-righteous fury as to befuddle any reasonable viewer.
There's more than a little exaggeration here. Indeed, the feminist viewpoint is so overstated as to tear the dramatic fabric of the movie itself.
Weaver's Alice Goodwin is seen as a good, caring mother who holds down a part-time job as school nurse while helping her husband Howard David Strathairn) run the family farm. She does, however, speak her mind.
While baby-sitting her best friends' children, she is momentarily distracted and the youngest child accidentally drowns. The community swiftly condemns her, first with angry whispers and sullen stares. And when the tragedy encourages a naughty boy's mother (Chloe Sevigny) to bring bogus charges of child abuse against Alice, the entire town instantly rises up against her.
She's jailed and her financially struggling husband cannot raise the bail that is set staggeringly high. Her fellow inmates taunt her unmercifully, and even Howard doubts her.
It gets worse, but what is most troubling is that Alice seems to enjoy her victimization. What Weaver and first-time director Scott Elliott fail to make clear is whether this aberration is the result of a mental breakdown or simply Alice's way to cope with an impossible situation.
For that matter, everyone's behavior is curious. Why is Howard so insensitive? Why do all of Alice's friends and colleagues turn against her on such flimsy evidence? Why does the child's mother even bother with the false charge?
The answer to all these questions is that the film, adapted by Peter Hedges and Polly Platt from Jane Hamilton's novel, wants to make a point. Society goes out of its way to punish independent women, and the filmmakers apparently feel no obligation to make any of this plausible.
Weaver's performance is certainly never dull, but she fails to let us inside her character. We're never certain what motivates her.
Strathairn has been handed a loaded deck with this role: The filmmakers were determined that the husband act the complete wimp throughout the ordeal. And Julianne Moore, as Alice's estranged best friend who finally comes to her rescue, has her puzzling moment too when she makes a pass at Alice's husband. Where did that come from?
The film, shot near this city where it had its premiere, is exceedingly well-made. But it becomes overbearing during those moments when it tries so hard to shock and disturb.
A MAP OF THE WORLD
Overseas Filmgroup
Producers: Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, Lisa Niedenthal
Director: Scott Elliott
Writers: Peter Hedges, Polly Platt
Based on the novel by: Jane Hamilton
Executive Producer: Willi Baer
Director of photography: Seamus McGarvey
Production designer: Richard Toyon
Music: Pat Metheny
Costume designer: Suzette Daigle
Editors: Craig McKay, Naomi Geraghty
Color/stereo
Cast:
Alice Goodwin: Sigourney Weaver
Theresa Collins: Julianne Moore
Howard Goodwin: David Strathairn
Paul Reverdy: Arliss Howard
Carole MacKessy: Chloe Sevigny
Nellie: Louise Fletcher
Running time -- 125 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 9/17/1999
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Alternately powerful and aggravating because of its uncinemat- ic approach, "The Designated Mourner" is a well-intentioned but commercially negligible film record of Wallace Shawn's 1996 play that was successfully staged at London's National Theatre.
The First Look Pictures release opens Friday in New York and next month in Los Angeles.
Comparisons to Shawn's "My Dinner With Andre" and the films of Spalding Gray are appropriate, but "Mourner" as directed by David Hare ("Strapless") is so lean and static that theater fans may come away satisfied, but less-disciplined audiences will be squirming in their seats.
Featuring the cast of the stage version - Miranda Richardson, David de Keyser and Mike Nichols in his first major on-screen performance - "Mourner" is set in an unnamed country in the grips of a repressive regime.
Jack (Nichols), a student with low-brow attitudes about culture, is married to Bohemian blue blood Judy Richardson), and in the opening moments it's clear that he's is resentful of her intellectual father, Howard (de Keyser).
With the actors seated behind a table in an unadorned room and speaking in turns directly to the camera in close shots, a little history and a lot of their personalities are quickly revealed.
There's a tragic, cautionary tale to come, but the power of the work comes from the way the performers recount and interpret events and their feelings through Shawn's superb dialogue.
"Mourner" is about the death of culture and the way the guardians of such higher human aspirations often unwittingly help the process, with Jack emerging as the most vital character.
Howard is a critic of the regime and is eventually imprisoned - along with many others when a reign of terror occurs.
Losing his mental balance, Jack isolates himself and confronts his shortcomings, coming to the conclusion that the "trash" he prefers - TV, pornography - is as legitimate as high culture.
But when Howard and Judy are murdered by the regime, Jack is devastated and Nichols' deeply emotional performance results in his character becoming a "designated mourner" - the last person left who remembers Howard, Judy and their clan.
Verging on the apocalyptic, "Mourner" shifts moods swiftly, and the frequent use of dissolves provides a much-needed structure to the unfolding monologues.
THE DESIGNATED MOURNER
First Look Pictures
A BBC Films presentation
A Greenpoint film
Director David Hare
Writer Wallace Shawn
Producers Donna Grey, David Hare
Executive producers Mark Shivas, Simon Curtis
Director of photography Oliver Stapleton
Production designer Bob Crowley
Music Richard Hartley
Editor George Akers
Color/stereo
Cast:
Jack Mike Nichols
Judy Miranda Richardson
Howard David de Keyser
Running time -- 94 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
The First Look Pictures release opens Friday in New York and next month in Los Angeles.
Comparisons to Shawn's "My Dinner With Andre" and the films of Spalding Gray are appropriate, but "Mourner" as directed by David Hare ("Strapless") is so lean and static that theater fans may come away satisfied, but less-disciplined audiences will be squirming in their seats.
Featuring the cast of the stage version - Miranda Richardson, David de Keyser and Mike Nichols in his first major on-screen performance - "Mourner" is set in an unnamed country in the grips of a repressive regime.
Jack (Nichols), a student with low-brow attitudes about culture, is married to Bohemian blue blood Judy Richardson), and in the opening moments it's clear that he's is resentful of her intellectual father, Howard (de Keyser).
With the actors seated behind a table in an unadorned room and speaking in turns directly to the camera in close shots, a little history and a lot of their personalities are quickly revealed.
There's a tragic, cautionary tale to come, but the power of the work comes from the way the performers recount and interpret events and their feelings through Shawn's superb dialogue.
"Mourner" is about the death of culture and the way the guardians of such higher human aspirations often unwittingly help the process, with Jack emerging as the most vital character.
Howard is a critic of the regime and is eventually imprisoned - along with many others when a reign of terror occurs.
Losing his mental balance, Jack isolates himself and confronts his shortcomings, coming to the conclusion that the "trash" he prefers - TV, pornography - is as legitimate as high culture.
But when Howard and Judy are murdered by the regime, Jack is devastated and Nichols' deeply emotional performance results in his character becoming a "designated mourner" - the last person left who remembers Howard, Judy and their clan.
Verging on the apocalyptic, "Mourner" shifts moods swiftly, and the frequent use of dissolves provides a much-needed structure to the unfolding monologues.
THE DESIGNATED MOURNER
First Look Pictures
A BBC Films presentation
A Greenpoint film
Director David Hare
Writer Wallace Shawn
Producers Donna Grey, David Hare
Executive producers Mark Shivas, Simon Curtis
Director of photography Oliver Stapleton
Production designer Bob Crowley
Music Richard Hartley
Editor George Akers
Color/stereo
Cast:
Jack Mike Nichols
Judy Miranda Richardson
Howard David de Keyser
Running time -- 94 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
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