*Oscar and Lucinda* is based on a brilliant, though very tough-to-adapt, novel by Peter Carey. It is a small miracle that director Gillian Armstrong succeeded so magnificently. (I'm giving all the credit to her: the end-credits tell us that the script was developed by the "Australian Film Commission" or something, whatever that is. I doubt that they were actually on the set.) For all you young filmmakers out there dreaming of making a Big Epic with Big Themes, I urge you to watch this movie right now, and learn how to construct a narrative out of the most rambling source material. The two titular characters -- one starting out in England, the other in Sydney, Australia -- don't even meet until about 40 minutes into the film; it's all the more impressive that we don't feel impatient for this meeting, realizing that their connection will occur as a result of the natural and logical development of the story. Aside from Oscar and Lucinda, Armstrong also has to manage about 8 or 9 other characters who will be crucial to the plot. Each character is introduced just when they need to be: the process is never hurried or confusing. As all the elements of narrative and character come together, we realize Armstrong has created nothing less than an art of cinematic fugue tantamount to genius.
Budding filmmakers may also want to take notes on Armstrong's judicious use of voice-over narration in the film. The Narrator pipes up only when he needs to, providing crucial information or the occasional bit of witty commentary. ("In order that I exist, two gamblers -- one obsessive, the other compulsive -- must declare themselves.") It's also marvelous how the Narrator himself, seemingly so omniscient, becomes the very culmination of the story. In other words, the Narrator is a key element, rather than a superfluous chatterbox -- the case of most movie narrators.
The story is set in the 1850's, revolving around a saintly young Anglican minister (Ralph Fiennes) who, trying to escape his gambling addiction, takes a ship to Australia. On board, he meets Lucinda (Cate Blanchett), an ahead-of-her-time independent businesswoman from Sydney who is returning home after a buying expedition for her glass-works factory. She is also nursing a gambling problem. Naturally, the two misfits form an immediate bond. Upon arriving in Sydney, Oscar promptly wrecks his ministry before it even gets started when he's caught playing cards with his new friend. Adding to his woes, he believes that Lucinda is in love with ANOTHER minister (Ciaran Hinds) who has already been run out of town -- banished to the church-less frontier -- because of his friendship with her. (Beautiful and single and a gambler, Lucinda is a sort of eye of a hurricane -- only her wealth keeps her from getting tarred and feathered, apparently.) The naif Oscar, despite all indications that his affection for her is reciprocated, hits upon a new wager: he bets Lucinda that he can deliver a glass church to Hinds via a dangerous overland journey across the continent. The stakes? Each other's inheritance . . . and, for Oscar, ultimate proof that he loves Lucinda more than any man.
This is a wonderful story, chock-full of some pretty startling ideas -- for instance, that religious faith itself is little more than a cosmic gamble -- and immersed in the visual symbols of water (i.e., Death) and glass (declared here as a solid form of liquid). The two symbolic motifs converge near movie's end, when Fiennes sits alone in the glass church as it floats down a river -- truly a magnificent sight to see that would justify a dozen lesser movies than this one. One review below mine judged this as "overdone": but it seems to me that if you aren't impressed with this image, then you just don't like the movies, sorry. I also differ with the general opinion that the climax of the film is intolerably depressing. It seems to me that God saves the saintly Oscar from an unhappy life shared with someone he could never love. True saints can never be with us for very long: they set examples for us, but they're soon called home to God. In any case, the movie's symbolism was telling you all along what Fiennes' fate would be.
Sorry for the long review, but this is a great film. Let me conclude by saying that Fiennes has never been better than here, perhaps because he's not handsomely and sulkily brooding, for once: Oscar is a true oddball, and Fiennes handles him delicately. Excellent work. And this movie also introduced us to the great Cate Blanchett, who has more than lived up to the promise that she manifested here.
9 stars out of 10.
Budding filmmakers may also want to take notes on Armstrong's judicious use of voice-over narration in the film. The Narrator pipes up only when he needs to, providing crucial information or the occasional bit of witty commentary. ("In order that I exist, two gamblers -- one obsessive, the other compulsive -- must declare themselves.") It's also marvelous how the Narrator himself, seemingly so omniscient, becomes the very culmination of the story. In other words, the Narrator is a key element, rather than a superfluous chatterbox -- the case of most movie narrators.
The story is set in the 1850's, revolving around a saintly young Anglican minister (Ralph Fiennes) who, trying to escape his gambling addiction, takes a ship to Australia. On board, he meets Lucinda (Cate Blanchett), an ahead-of-her-time independent businesswoman from Sydney who is returning home after a buying expedition for her glass-works factory. She is also nursing a gambling problem. Naturally, the two misfits form an immediate bond. Upon arriving in Sydney, Oscar promptly wrecks his ministry before it even gets started when he's caught playing cards with his new friend. Adding to his woes, he believes that Lucinda is in love with ANOTHER minister (Ciaran Hinds) who has already been run out of town -- banished to the church-less frontier -- because of his friendship with her. (Beautiful and single and a gambler, Lucinda is a sort of eye of a hurricane -- only her wealth keeps her from getting tarred and feathered, apparently.) The naif Oscar, despite all indications that his affection for her is reciprocated, hits upon a new wager: he bets Lucinda that he can deliver a glass church to Hinds via a dangerous overland journey across the continent. The stakes? Each other's inheritance . . . and, for Oscar, ultimate proof that he loves Lucinda more than any man.
This is a wonderful story, chock-full of some pretty startling ideas -- for instance, that religious faith itself is little more than a cosmic gamble -- and immersed in the visual symbols of water (i.e., Death) and glass (declared here as a solid form of liquid). The two symbolic motifs converge near movie's end, when Fiennes sits alone in the glass church as it floats down a river -- truly a magnificent sight to see that would justify a dozen lesser movies than this one. One review below mine judged this as "overdone": but it seems to me that if you aren't impressed with this image, then you just don't like the movies, sorry. I also differ with the general opinion that the climax of the film is intolerably depressing. It seems to me that God saves the saintly Oscar from an unhappy life shared with someone he could never love. True saints can never be with us for very long: they set examples for us, but they're soon called home to God. In any case, the movie's symbolism was telling you all along what Fiennes' fate would be.
Sorry for the long review, but this is a great film. Let me conclude by saying that Fiennes has never been better than here, perhaps because he's not handsomely and sulkily brooding, for once: Oscar is a true oddball, and Fiennes handles him delicately. Excellent work. And this movie also introduced us to the great Cate Blanchett, who has more than lived up to the promise that she manifested here.
9 stars out of 10.