Lantana
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Movie Reviews of Lantana
Movie Review: Murder Mystery
Summary: 5 Stars
Excellent story and it's a good murder mystery. Loved all aspects of it especially the song at the end by Celia Cruz, Te busco. So beautiful. Sad movie, but again, it's well executed.Movie Review: Spectacular Murder who-done-it with a Latin/Cuban soundtrack
Summary: 5 Stars
Great movie...one of those that slips by unnoticed. Real and to the point. And the soundtrack is incredible...someone knew his latin musicMovie Review: Almost 5 stars....
Summary: 4 Stars
Lantana was quietly lauded as one of the year's best films, and it is a finely crafted effort from director Ray Lawrence. Set in Australia, its symbolism is reflected in the lantana bush, a beautiful flowering plant that is almost a supporting character in the movie. The lantana, I am told, can be controlled and cultivated to make a lovely garden, if it is nurtured. Left to its own devices, it grows out of control. Such are the relationships in this film, many of which teeter on the brink, and some that end due to neglect, confusion and frustration.Lantana is a tale of four marriages - and the beginning of a love affair. All can be nurtured back to health, if the parties desire, but all are nearly extinguished in the film. There is a serendipity in the coincidental intertwinings of the characters (yes, ala Robert Altman!). The central character, Leon Zat, played by Anthony LaPaglia, is frustrated and angry as his marriage and career become meaningless to him. LaPaglia is the reason I gave the film only four stars. He's been a favorite of mine, and although his performance is credible, Lawrence needed
a central figure whose chemistry with the ensemble made the need, past love and dialogue believable. LaPaglia does a workmanlike job, but the film could have been a classic with Tim Robbins, Sean Penn, or Kevin Spacey (I nominate him for every good leading role!) who could have created the onscreen heat with wife Sonja (the sensuous and talented Kerry Armstrong), lover Jane (Rachael Blake in a strong performance), and his partner, Claudia (Leah Purcell is luminous.
Leon's a cop, and the film opens with a jolting view of a hidden body. We know it is a woman, but which one? Later in the film we meet Jane's estranged husband - her neighbors Nik and Paula, and another central couple - Dr. Somers (Barbara Hershey) and John Knox (Geoffrey Rush) as a psychologist who treats Sonja; grieving with John over the loss of a murdered daughter. Rush and Hershey are impeccable as a couple, and new comers Vince Colosimo and Danielle Farinacci ( Nik and Paula)shine in the film. Their sense of love and trust, despite betrayal, make the viewers finally believe in married love again.
A unique love story wrapped around a murder mystery, Lantana also explores, in brief, the relationships between the men in the cast - in an honest and thought provoking way.
Although it may evolve too slowly for some, Lantana is a lush, visual portrayal of the nature of married love as it ages; and leaves you with both a sense of renewal and pain.
I look forward to more films by Lawrence.
Movie Review: Altmanian Australia
Summary: 4 Stars
The influence of Robert Altman is strongly felt in this powerful drama, in that the storyline technique he pioneered with Nashville of events that make disparate characters converge is here used to powerful effect.An unhappily married cop--Zat--played quite well by Anthony LaPaglia--is tense and uncertain enough about his life to engage in a brief affair with another woman and occasionally fly off the handle at his wife, his partner, and others in the immediate area. His wife suspects the affair and begins seeing a psychiatrist--Barbara Hershey in a great performance--who is also unhappily married, and who suspects her own husband of having an affair with another man.
Zat's partner, a woman, is interested in a man she occasionally sees at a restaurant she frequents--the same man Zat bumps into while jogging. The psychiatrist's husband, played by Geoffrey Rush in an understated and effective performance, finds Zat obtrusive during his relentless questioning regarding his wife's disappearance--she's inexplicably missing one night. These are a few examples of the convergence of character-driven events that Ray Lawrence, the director, uses to drive the film onwards.
This is not as much a movie about relationships as it is about uncertainty. What do I really know about this person I've been with all these years? How do I really feel about him/her? If I don't really know the answer to this question, what do I do about it? How do I do what I want without hurting somebody? If I do hurt somebody, then what do I do? The idea of using the Altman technique to explore uncertainty IN relationships, between people, is a great one, and it's used here extremely well.
When we see these characters converge with potentially overly coincidental events, this works because the emotional tones (both under- and over-) in the film are strongly developed, so much so that the convergences seem exactly right.
The one minor gripe I have is that LaPaglia, though born in Australia, veers back and forth between a halfway decent Australian accent and an obvious American one. Other than that, this is a very strong film and definitely worth seeing.
Movie Review: Not a perfect film, but one to check out
Summary: 4 Stars
Given my frustration with the vast amount of junk coming out of Hollywood, I recently have been seeking smaller films that don't wear the independent patch in navel-gazing exercises, but instead focus on characters as people rather than plot devices. AND PLEASE CAN WE HAVE A MOVIE WHERE THINGS DON'T EXPLODE EVERY FIVE MINUTES.I saw this movie when it originally came out and it unfortunately was touted as the best thing since sliced bread. Tough to live up to, but hype aside it is a nice mystery where the characters are more important than who done it and in this case who was done in.
I won't reveal any details about this movie as some reviewers felt it necessary to tell you who was done in and although it's ultimately not as important as the characters in the movie, it does give a slowly moving film a needed punch as several clues and red herrings about several aspects of the story serve as enhacements.
The performances, with the exception of Barbara Hershey who is ok, are flawless. Even secondary roles are fleshed out and played by very strong actors. I may be somewhat unfair to single out Hershey as part of her role in the movie is to portray a profession that always seems like a cliche when seen on screen.
I liked this movie and in many ways reminded me of Robert Altman's pictures, where there are a plethora of characters that somehow have something to do with one another. The pacing is also Altmanesque and that will bother some viewers who want the movie to move faster than it does. Although I generally like the slow pace when the material warrants it, here I think that the movie could have done with a shorter running time by cutting some scenes which seem repetitive and maybe trimming a character or two.
Not big complaints here. I don't think that this is the greatest movie I've seen, but it is 100 times better than your good domestic release without the pretention that sometimes accompany said efforts. With the realms of what it is, I would highly recommend it over the wildly overrated "The Deep End", another similar genre movie that came out that same year.