Felicia's Journey
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Movie Reviews of Felicia's Journey
Movie Review: Purity itself can surely wash the pain away.
Summary: 4 Stars
Felicia's Journey was one of those films that I loved, then hated, then liked, then thought was decent. It was a difficult film to watch because the pacing that Egoyan has implemented is unlike any other film that I have seen. His use of the camera to create that uneasy sensation on screen and while watching the film was very impressive. Hoskins gives the performance of his career as this very controlled man with a very dark secret while Elaine Cassidy impressed me with her simplistic portrayal of Felicia. This was a brilliant film, but there were just some scenes and elements that didn't seem to match the rest of the film. The ending in particular was a bit misleading and at times rushed, but everything building up to that point really hit a strong nerve. If you were to define the word "thriller", I don't think that you could do it without mentioning this film. Brilliant acting, an interesting use of direction (which worked very well), and a story that allowed itself to be build upon during each scene are just a few of the great moments (that overshadow the poor) in this movie.
Felicia's Journey would not have been the powerhouse that it was if it was not for the powerful acting by Bob Hoskins who completely engulfed this character and showed us this rare glimpse of evil humanity. While I am sure that some of it is due in part by Egoyan's direction, but you cannot keep your eyes off Hoskins whenever he is on the screen. He builds his character so well, and bit by bit, that you never can anticipate what will he will say or do next. That is what is brilliant about Hoskins. Normally, when you have a troubled soul like Hilditch you can sometimes guess what he is going to do next. Actors sometimes fall into a pattern of repetition, but with Hoskins it was as if we were watching the final chapter and there were bigger events taking place. He also worked so well with Cassidy that at times I had forgotten that I was watching a film. His ability to be this sinister father figure to this girl was impressive. Hoskins really built this beautiful family dynamic to the film that I never saw coming. Outstanding performances by both that any film connoisseurs should not miss.
Taped onto the vintage acting is this deeply engrossing story that pours from the bottle like some freshly corked wine. The simplicity of the story allows the complexity of the characters emerge and be triumphant. The story gives our characters layers upon which we gradually peel away. Hoskins character especially. From the opening scene until the final, I felt as if I was given the whole course, and not just bits and pieces. While Felicia's name does take the title of this film, it is Hoskins whom this story is really about. We learn more about his life, and his struggles than we do with Felicia. Yet, the story does not stop there. I found it quite interesting that Felicia father caused her conflict, while a matriarchal figure challenged Hilditch's perception. I thought that Egoyan was really trying to do more than tell a serial killer story (as the box may reveal) by giving us these strange and strangled family moments. I felt as if this was more a story about family, then it was about the horrors of humanity ... or perhaps it was a slice of both. Either way, the story is the foundation to this picture, and for the first time it really worked. So many times we go to the theater expecting to be blown away by a creative and empowering story, but this time it was a polar opposite. The acting is what kept this film high above water, while the story (as simple as it was) only helped build Hoskins and Cassidy further into the world of impressiveness.
Finally, there was Egoyan behind the camera doing what he does best. I have seen only one of his other films, Exotica, and he is notorious for building the suspense from behind the camera as well as in front. His choice of panning in the wrong direction, the colors surrounding our characters and the sound of the film hit our nerves before any actors even walk into the picture. This is all coming from Egoyan's mind, which continues to impress me with each film that I view. I cannot wait to see more of his work and to see how well he has developed with each project. You can definitely see the Hitchcock influence that has been imprinted with Egoyan. I finished watching Frenzy (by Hitchcock) right after this film and the similarities were uncanny. Egoyan reminds me of a cross between Hitchcock and von Trier. His bold style makes each film his own, yet he is not afraid to be brutally honest and attributive to the cultural setting. He is a true filmmaker that needs to continue to prove that you don't need millions to create a masterpiece.
While I have given credit to everyone, and thing, that deserves it in this film, I must finish this review by saying that this film was not perfection on a stick, but very close. There were some unfinished ends that could have been tied better, and the ending just felt as if there was this outside influence at work that Egoyan was battling. Up until the final twenty minutes of this film, I was thoroughly enjoying what I was seeing, but when the idea of religion was brought in from left field, I felt the final moments were rushed and forced. I needed something just as dramatic, just not so random. Also, I needed some form of conclusion to Felicia's actual "journey". Did she find what she was looking for?
Overall, I was very impressed with this film.
Grade: **** out of *****
Movie Review: A JOURNEY TO REMEMBER...
Summary: 4 Stars
This film adaptation of William Trevor's novel of psychological suspense, for which its author was the recipient of the 1994 Whitbread Award, is one that those who read the book should see, as well as those who like unusual films of psychological suspense. After reading the book, I became curious as to how a film adaptation would work, as so much of the book involves the introspections of two people whose lives interconnect. Despite some of its shortcomings, it is definitely a film worth seeing, if only for Bob Hoskins brilliant performance.
Felicia is a seventeen year old motherless and naive Irish girl, who has become intimate with an Irish boy named Johnny. Of course, the expected ensues, and after Johnny has left Ireland and returned to England where he ostensibly works, Felicia is left holding the bag. Her disapproving father suspects Johnny of actually being in the British Army and, thus, a traitor to his own. He also has a few choice words for his daughter, now that she is in the family way, and none of it is flattering. So, Felicia leaves her rural village and her family and goes off in search of Johnny, having nothing more than the vaguest of ideas where he might be.
She crosses the Irish Sea and arrives in the English Midlands in the industrial city of Birmingham, as she believes Johnny to be working in a lawn mower factory there. In her search for Johnny, she runs into the portly catering manager for one of the local factories. His name is Joseph Ambrose Hilditch, and he is outwardly a jovial and agreeable man, well-liked by his co-workers and meticulous about his culinary repasts. He lives in solitary splendor in the large house in which he grew up. There, he concocts lavish gourmet meals, while watching tapes of his deceased mother's television show, as she was a chef of some renown. Obviously, he was quite close to his mother, and he still misses her. The house is cluttered with collectibles but is well-kept, although decorated in the style of a bygone era. Mr. Hilditch is, indeed, a collector, but his collection is initially far beyond Felicia's imaginings. In fact, Mr. Hilditch has a darker side to him, which is not immediately discernible by the unwary.
When Felicia first meets Mr. Hilditch, it is to ask for information in connection with her fool's errand, but something about her catches Mr. Hilditch's fancy, and he finds himself keeping Felicia in his crosshairs. When Felicia seemingly unexpectedly runs into Mr. Hilditch again, he directs her to lodgings, and so it begins. As Mr. Hilditch insinuates himself ever so slowly into her life, weaving a fantasy about his own life that is sure to put her mind at ease about him. Felicia begins finding herself ensnared by this ostensibly kind and ever so helpful, avuncular man, and she initially fails to see the darkness that lies at the core of his being. The viewer, however, is given sneak peaks into some of his peculiarities and deceits.
Bob Hoskins is magnificent in the role of Mr. Hilditch, infusing the character with an avuncular charm that sits as a thin veneer over the cauldron of seething emotion within, emotions that cause Mr. Hilditch to act in ways most others would not. The viewer sees what Felicia fails to see, until it is almost too late, the duplicity and cunning that is masked by his overt geniality and seeming kindness. Like a spider to the fly, our teddy bearish Mr. Hilditch begins laying his trap, and so Felicia's journey thrusts her into the belly of the beast. Newcomer, Eileen Cassidy is quite good as Felicia, playing her with a naiveté that is central to the character. Unlike the character of Mr. Hilditch, who physically stays true to the Mr. Hilditch of the book, the Felicia of the film differs physically. Instead of a pail, puling, nun like blonde, the viewer is presented with a robust looking, fresh-faced brunette.
The cinematography is excellent, and the interior of Mr. Hilditch's home is magnificent, as it evokes another era, miring Mr. Hilditch in happier times while at home. The musical soundtrack is used to good effect to maintain that evocation. The director, Atom Egoyan, who also wrote the screenplay, does a fairly good job of adapting the book to the screen, given some of the constraints inherent in the book. Where the film fails somewhat is in the exploration of the darker corners of the human psyche, although he maintains the cat and mouse game that is central to the story. While the mind of Mr. Hilditch is dark, indeed, unlike the book, there are no unspeakable revelations in the film as to what lies at the heart of his predilection. What the director substitutes does not really satisfy the viewer as to why Mr. Hilditch does what he does.
The film, however, manages to show how each of these two flawed human beings were initially able to achieve a connection with another, only to find ostensible betrayal. What is decidedly different is the way that they each cope with that betrayal. Moreover, the book has no happily-ever-after ending to its story, which culminates with a conclusion that is quite bleak, robbing the reader of some satisfaction. The film's conclusion differs from that of the book, and while less bleak, is also somewhat unsatisfactory but, perhaps, only so to those who may have already read the book. As in the book, the journey that Felicia makes is larger in scope than merely a trip across the Irish Sea.
Movie Review: A Nicely Detailed Character Study
Summary: 4 Stars
This film is, I must admit, my introduction to Egoyan's works. He is a director who comes highly recommended by a friend whose taste in films I admire. There is, indeed, much to admire about Felicia's Journey. The cinematography is excellent, with many memorable frames. One that particularly sticks in my mind is a shot of a nuclear power plant, brilliantly photographed, that captures the emptiness of the landscape, as well as being a harbinger and symbol of the roiling emotions that lay beneath the surface of the main character's (Hilditch's)calm exterior. There are many such nuances in the film. Egoyan is clearly a director with a sure hand.
We know from the outset of the film that there is something not quite right about Hilditch (Bob Hoskins). What makes the character interesting and keeps us in suspense for a time, is that the character can go either way. Early on, it looks as if he may just be a mild mannered eccentric who has a compulsion about the proper preperation of food. We see him comically standing at the prep table in his elaborate home kitchen, carefully mimicing the step by step instructions of a rather ditzy French Lady Chef on a small screen TV.
The same is true of Felicia (Elaine Cassidy), who arrives at the customs desk in England, having come over by ferry from N Ireland. She is the ultimate rube, not even realizing that Northern Ireland is part of the UK, when the customs officer explains that that is why she doesn't need a passport. We are set up to expect very little out of naive, lost-girl Felicia.
The first indicator that something is not right with Hilditch is conveyed very subtly. Directly after the characters first meet and Hilditch has directed Felicia to a factory where she might possibly locate her boyfriend (the object of her visit), the camera shows Hilditch stopping his car and checking Felicia out in his rear view mirror for a fleeting moment. We know from that moment that there are ominous things on the horizon. We just don't know how onminous or how severe. As the plot and the characters develop, we gradually come to learn the sordid truth.
Excellent preformances from the leads and several supporting characters (particularly from Egoyan's wife, Arsinée Khanjian). The Lost Girl scenes (as viewed from a secret video camera planted on the dashboard of Hilditch's car) were fairly effective in the final edit. Yet the extended scenes in the DVD extras showed just how painfully amateurish these young actresses actually were. First year drama class material. The East Indies Bible lady was also playing to stereotype and her expressions consisted more of mugging than acting.
In the final analysis, the film was satisfying enough to make me want to seek out more Egoyan films. I think The Sweet Hereafter will be next on my list.
BEK
Movie Review: Excellent performance by Bob Hoskins; truly fine story
Summary: 4 Stars
If you aren't already delighted by Bob Hoskins's versatility, by all means see this film. The man who interacted so well with animated characters in "Roger Rabbit" scores again as a brooding, lonely single man whose character was mis-shaped by a domineering, non-maternal t.v. personality mother.Under Atom Egoyan's superb direction, the complexity of the characters and their situations unfolds so slowly and subtly that the collision course they are on is not immediately obvious. One wonders why Hilditch/Hoskins is so obsessed with the t.v. French chef, Gala, to the point of owning films of all her shows and a good many food processors she endorses, until one realizes that the chubby boy in the black and white films is Hilditch as a frustrated child. The child abuse caught on camera makes one wonder what childhood was like in the spacious, empty house that Hilditch has always called home.
It is almost possible sympathize with Hilditch's sad attempts to bond with various females, all clearly too young and too street-hardened to be good partners for him, until it becomes obvious what their fates have been and what fate awaits the tragic figure of Felicia--whose pregnancy causes her to be rejected by the child's father, his mother, and her own father. It is a very interesting twist that the unwanted pregnancy is ultimately what buys Felicia the required time to save her life.
I would give this movie five stars but for what I perceive as a couple of minor flaws. Sometimes I thought Hoskins had a bit of a problem maintaining his English accent. Also, I am not altogether convinced that releasing his last would-be victim and committing suicide was a totally believeable reaction by Hilditch to his encounter with the born-again oddballs who came knocking on his garden gate, even if they did seem to pose some threat that his homocidal proclivities might soon be revealed. But then, it could be argued that a man who spent so much time insulating himself with walls (the garden wall, his house, the building in which he worked, and his car) might just feel he had nowhere to go but out when it appeared that those walls had been invaded.
Viewing "Felicia's Journey" is a most worthwhile experience. It seems that Hoskins just keeps getting better with every performance. I personally can't wait to see what he does next.
Movie Review: Intriguing thriller is lesser Egoyan
Summary: 4 Stars
"Felicia's Journey" is an intriguing psychological thriller about a pregnant young Irish girl who goes to England looking for the father of her baby and finds instead a psychotic, middle-aged man disguised as savior. The brilliant Canadian director, Atom Egoyan, literally isn't quite at home with the material or the location [it was shot in Great Britain]. Consequently, the movie is not quite as good as my two favorites of his, "The Sweet Hereafter" and "Exotica", though it shares that same fascinating, hypnotic quality I so much admire. As Joe, a man whose facade conceals some dreadful secrets, Bob Hoskins is awesome. He seems so innocent and well-meaning until you notice how quickly the look in his eyes can go from benign to malignant. Elaine Cassidy is just about perfect as Felicia, the young girl. She gives her dignity and purpose, portraying her as a good girl who doesn't have a clue as to how to deal with her problems. She lets Joe lure her in, not because she is stupid, but because she is innocent and unworldly.
This is not a commercial movie. One of the main reasons is that Joe is not an over-the-top villain. He is all too similar to lots of people we see every day. He does appear to be a bit furtive and secretive at times, but not so much so that anyone would suspect his dreadful other side. He is not over there in some special place we pretend madmen live in. He's just the nice man who lives next door. We can't distance ourselves from him easily, and that's an uncomfortable feeling. We are much more at home with the likes of Hannibal Lecter, who safely exists only in a book or a movie.
Despite its faults, "Felicia's Journey is much better than the average thriller, in particular because its images stick with you long after you've seen it.
Since I have not read the novel the movie is based on, I can't comment on how the two compare.