Source:
rec.art.movies.reviews newsgroup
Rating:
|
John Le Carre is probably best known for his Cold War thrillers. At least he once was. With the Cold War over there was some question if he could still have subject matter for riveting thrillers. THE CONSTANT GARDENER is, in fact, a very good story set in the modern world. The film that director Fernando Meirelles (who previously directed CITY OF GOD) has made from the novel is exciting and educational. He tells his story set against a backdrop of not only his usual international politics but also global business and international medicine. The three have interests interwoven together and the story takes us to such diverse locations as London, Kenya, Italy, and Sudan.
Justin Quayle (played Ralph Fiennes) has just lost his wife Tessa (Rachel Weisz). Quayle is a minor British diplomat and she is a political activist. They met when she heckled one of his speeches and they fell in love in spite of representing opposite ends of the political spectrum. When she died she was off with a black activist, Arnold (Hubert Kounde) on some political mission Quayle did not know about. She was murdered, perhaps by Arnold. Evidence shows that she and Arnold may even have been clandestine lovers. Justin just wants to understand what happened and who was it who killed his wife. Had she been using him and his political position? The more answers he finds, the bigger the remaining questions get. The mystery includes drug cartels and their experiments to test new drugs. What Quayle finds is both realistic and chilling. The story has action, but it also is intelligent from first to last. One always feels that Le Carre knows the political and economic situation and the film is every bit as informative as a Tom Clancy story.
The writing of the script is crisp and keen and suspenseful. Characters are complex and frequently take a while to understand as they are developed. In fact much of the thrust of the plot is just to understand the real motivations of some of the characters. In a world as shady as the cold war, characters are not what they seem.
THE CONSTANT GARDENER also offers some beautiful photography of Africa by Cesar Charlone. The score by Alberto Iglesias includes some nice native song. It may be the best story of political intrigue we have seen on the screen in quite a while. I rate it a +3 on the -4 to +4 scale or 9/10.
By : Mark R. Leeper
|
