Far From Heaven
|
List Price: Our Price: $1.48 You Save: $13.50 (90%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Canada
Movie Reviews of Far From Heaven
Movie Review: Barriers that Imprison the Heart
Summary: 5 Stars
Much has been said about the plot of Far From Heaven - so much, in fact, that anyone casually reading the reviews would know more than they ever needed to know about the storyline. That said, I want to talk about the real "guts" of this film, which has to do with more than its breathtakingly lush production and the truly immortal performance by Julianne Moore.Every great actress has a career-defining role. Joan Crawford had Mildred Pierce. Jessica Lange had Frances. Nicole Kidman had Moulin Rouge. And now Julianne Moore has her unforgettable performance - in Far From Heaven. Obviously, all these performances have something in common...the brilliant, lyrical mastery and poetic imagery they brought to their roles. Moore truly transcends her written character, making Cathy Whitaker very much a real, yet larger-than-life and somehow ideal, creature.
The film's main message is not a confrontation of '50s artifice with brutal emotional reality. Nor is it a tribute or satire of the "women's picture" or weeper. It simply uses the forgotten, yet essential, genre of melodrama to move an audience. Melodrama has rarely been better than it is here...because it is combined with a powerful message.
Not everyone has found the message. You have to dig for it. Love is our only happiness, and yet society has imposed barriers that separate us from the people we love. In the 1950s, one of the barriers was between interracial couples. Another was between people of the same sex. The great tragedy was these people could not realize their love for each other and be together in the society of the times (hence, the film's quote, "What imprisons desires of the heart?").
By contrasting these two barriers, the film not only exposes the barriers that kept us from love and happines in the past, but also shows how far our society still has to go. With gay rights and marriage on the horizon, few films were more relevant - and historically intelligent - than Far From Heaven. The film was the great, often misunderstood, masterpiece of 2002.
Movie Review: Far from Heaven stands out in a sea of mediocrity
Summary: 5 Stars
It has been two years and many movies since this movie came out, but I keep coming back to Far from Heaven as a movie of substance and very fine acting. The story itself is static and engaging; the multi-dimensional story keeps one's interest and engages the emotions meaningfully.
One story line is Dennis Quaid's character's emerging homosexuality and its effect on his wife, himself, and their marriage.Another aspect is His wife's (Julianne Moore) relationship with their gardener (Dennis Haysbert). Racial prejudice and tension are laced throughout the film; racist violence erupts when a few schoolboys hurt the gardener's young daughter, taunting her about her daddy's "white girlfriend." Moore's and Haysbert's characters innocently begin a casual relationship which begins to blossom into deeper feeling; this is where the movie soared, the characters beautifully and effectively conveying that the heart is color blind. I loved watching Miss Moore's character, especially, as she was a fine person with a pure heart, and it was refreshing to experience that innocence and goodness.
The ending wasn't happy, but it was realistic. Whatever relationship the two main characters had or wanted to have, was constrained by the social mores of the times, by the limitations society put on interactions between the races, spec., between blacks and whites, even in New England, where the story takes place. Miss Moore's character watches the gardener leave on a traIn at the end, and her expression at their farewell is a magnificent piece of acting, speaking volumes without a word being uttered.
This movie truly moved me and was thought provoking, with well-drawn, complex characters. Adult language and situations existed but were kept to a minimum, thus (for me) enabling the story to develop well without these kinds of distractions.
Movie Review: A truly beautiful film and experience...
Summary: 5 Stars
Made as a homage to "Woman's pictures" of the 1950's this film is visually stunning, historically explorative and in part glides along like a well oiled machine, while also suffering major and difficult breakdowns on route.
While the film has one foot firmly in the past, both in terms of the decade it is set and the style of film it aims to be, it also has a contempary eye for how frank it ought to be and for how much better equipped a modern audience is likely to be at dealing with heavy weight themes in an explicit manner.
It is hard to believe that social restraints so suffocating existied in such a recent portion of our past, it has echoes of Edith Wharton in the delicate nature of social order and the silent castigation and alienation meeted out for percieved social crimes, I was reminded particularly of "House of Mirth".
It is hard to believe that homosexuality and race issues were ever such potent problems and yet we are slotted gently into a world in which such issues were highly taboo, we have the comfort of the knowledge of change but the characters cannot share our comfort or have any idea of the changes we take for granted. This is sterlingly communicated in the four central performances. And yet inspite of a year or more in time being alluded to as the stories framework, it seems to be perpetually Autumn, the winds of great change blowing hard throughout perhaps. Moore's performance in particular, is fragile and yet stonily veneered to a fault, vulnerable yet stoic and her beautiful performance is so delicate as to scream out in pain.
Why Moore did not win the Oscar for her performance is beyond my personal fathoming. This film is beautiful, moving and an experience that will haunt you for some time to come. It's social and historical comments are accurate, couragous and superbly told.
Movie Review: Superbly acted and directed look at 1950s America
Summary: 5 Stars
"Far From Heaven', Todd Haynes' homage to the grand screen melodramas of the 1950s, is the most elegant American movie of 2002. It also has one great performance by an actress in Julianne Moore's portrayal of Cathy Whitaker. I found the film mesmerizing, as well as meaningful. Though the story is easy to follow, it will prove too studied and `old fashioned' for many viewers. I suppose that to appreciate it fully, one must love movies. A knowledge of history is also helpful, as the film presumes that the audience is knowledgeable of the way society in America was in 1957. Kathy and her husband, Frank [Dennis Quaid], live in a lovely New Haven, CT suburb. They are a popular couple with two young children. Frank is a successful executive at a TV manufacturing company, while Kathy is active in charity work and in local arts groups. They are representative of the burgeoning middle class which sprung up after WWII. Still painfully aware of that dreadful conflict and blessed with a multitude of technological advances, the American people were consumed with creating a bright, beautiful, almost utopian world for themselves and their children. But life, of course, doesn't operate in a vacuum, nor does emotion. Desire and change have lives of their own. Underneath Frank and Kathy's perfectionist existence lies the truth about themselves and the world. Slowly but surely, reality wrecks their shimmering, idealistic construction.
The cinematography by Edward Lachman is gorgeous, and the set designs by Ellen Christiansen are about as close to the look of 1950s suburbia as you will ever see onscreen. Greatly enhancing the movie is the evocative music by Elmer Bernstein, whose first film score was written in 1951.
Highly recommended for those who like their movies to actually be about something of worth.
Movie Review: Desires of the heart. . .
Summary: 5 Stars
Far from Heaven sets a wonderful serene mood with its quiet autumnal vistas, echoed by the primarily orange and green color scheme. Everything is clean and new in Hartford Connecticut during the late 1950's; the cars--even the dark alleys. Cathy played by the incandescent Julianne Moore, is the perfect hostess, housewife and mother. Her husband, played by a wiry, edgy Dennis Quaid is the perfect father and successful businessman. Their gardener, Deagan, played by Dennis Haysbert, is squeaky clean as well, always wearing brand new clothes even though he just came out of the garden.
Civil rights issues are obliquely referred to as a distant problem occurring in other towns. Yet Cathy and her husband are both touched by passion that violates the expectations of small town 1950's society. When they cross the line, violence is threatened. Those who cross the line are firmly put in their place or shunned.
This movie makes the point that the serene beauty of this time is achieved at cost of loss of awareness and passion. The double life that must be lived by those who have longings for something other than the mainstream is hinted at by the movie marquee that advertises "The Three Faces of Eve".
This film is beautiful and passionate with a wonderful attention to detail. The flamboyant ultra-feminine clothing of the women and the brilliantly painted rooms and cars create a nostalgic mood that is contrasted by emotional tone of frustration and lonely despair. The autumn leaves in every scene hint at the death of this rigid patriarchal culture that oppressed minorities, women and children and sublimated all feeling in order to present an orderly, conformist appearance. A wonderful moody piece with brilliant acting. Highly recommended!