Who is the Genius?

Genius is the rather ambiguous title of a film about Maxwell Perkins, who was the editor to the works of  several American literary geniuses of the first half of the 20^th century.  It’s based on the ambiguously titled biography of Perkins written by A. Scott Berg, “Maxwell Perkins:  Editor of Genius.”  Who is the genius Berg is talking about — this particular editor, or the authors whose work he nurtured to publication, novels by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and Thomas Wolfe, to name the three authors that appear in the film.  Who is the genius of the film’s title?  The writer Thomas Wolfe, or, as F. Scott Fitzgerald calls Max Perkins, the genius at friendship. 

Genius is a sweet little character study of a movie, visually convincing, gentle, welcoming the audience into its beautifully produced world (with the barest acknowledgment of the Depression).  Michael Grandage directed the script by John Logan based on Berg’s biography of the editor to Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Wolfe, and Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, to name a few. 

While Genius purports to be based on the biography, it’s only a taste, a dram, an excerpt covering the years between when young Thomas Wolfe walked into Maxwell Perkins’ office at Charles Scribner’s Sons Publishers and Booksellers on Fifth Avenue with an overlong manuscript that would eventually be whittled down to become the very long novel, “Look Homeward, Angel.”  The younger man’s death in 1938, just over a decade after he walked into Perkins’ office, ends the story of the film.  Not even a third, in fact, of Perkins’ 37-year career as an editor of some of the most remarkable American authors of the first half of the 20^th century.  But the period it covers provides a beautiful stage for Colin Firth as Perkins and Jude Law as Wolfe to play together and become men of another time. 

Colin Firth is astute, smart, and heartfelt casting for Maxwell Perkins.  Repressed yet passionate, loving and compassionate but oh so quiet that his gentle smile is always a delightful surprise.  Maxwell Perkins was a nurturer, and Firth embraces us all.

Jude Law did deep and detailed character work in bringing the volatile Thomas Wolfe to life, apparently barely recognizable to some members of the audience when I saw the film, with his dark curly hair and southern accent contributing to his bold portrayal of the volatile young writer from Asheville.

 

Colin Firth as Maxwell Perkins and Jude Law as Thomas Wolfe.
Photo Credit: Marc Brenner/Roadside Attractions

How much like Thomas Wolfe was fellow southerner F. Scott Fitzgerald in his youth and health.  Here we see Fitzgerald as a middle-aged man weighed down by responsibility and reality.  Ernest Hemingway seems a mature sportsman, subdued yet warm and friendly, and prescient of young Wolfe’s eventual betrayal of his father figure Perkins.

Each famous writer is nicely played as a human being, not a famous author whose books we all read in high school.  Dominic West excels in his brief appearance as Ernest Hemingway.  Guy Pearce is a heartbreaking F. Scott Fitzgerald whose glory days are past, and whose wild and vivacious wife Zelda has sunken into mental illness.  In his exquisite sadness, it occurred to me Fitzgerald might have been glad the television series Endeavour did an adaptation of “The Great Gatsby” in a recent episode.

This shot appears several times in the film with the more modern buildings edited out!

Nicole Kidman did fine work as Wolfe’s paramour and sponsor, Mrs. Bernstein. She looked the part of the “older woman,” without vanity, which contributed to her believability. Some of the audience didn’t recognize her, either, until they saw her name in the credits, always a compliment to an actor.

Laura Linney was superb as Perkins’ wife Louise, aghast and downtrodden when Wolfe denigrated playwriting, her passion.  She was not merely someone’s wife or mother, she is a fully developed character, loving to her husband and children, angry when he chooses his work over a family vacation, rather judgmental of the married Mrs. Bernstein while still sympathetic.  Ms. Linney has grown into a remarkably sensitive actor whose every feeling is subtly offered to us. 

There are many pieces creating the whole of a film, and each element of Genius was of its time, the late 1920s through 1930s in New York City.  Music by Adam Cork was emotive without intruding, at one with fine cinematography by Ben Davis of a timely production design by Mark Digby.  In my mind’s eye the film is almost in black and white, although I know that it wasn’t.  Art direction by Alex Baily, Gareth Cousins, and Patrick Rolfe was complemented by costume design by Jane Petrie.

 

Firth as Perkins and Law as Wolfe commuting to Connecticut
Photo Credit: Marc Brenner/Roadside Attractions

John Logan, on the advice of biographer Berg, sensibly put the oft-read book aside to write the movie.  I read an article by a fellow who had read the excellent book and was very upset with all that was left out.  The biography of Max Perkins was about his life and his 37-year career.  Such things are difficult to cover in their entirety in a theatrical film.  Logan chose an dramatic segment with a volatile writer, and did a good job of it.

Much as I was captivated by the film, when I walked away from the theatre I felt something missing, only realizing what I missed as I wrote this.  I missed that whole story, which can only be apprehended by reading A. Scott Berg’s biography of Perkins and the works of Perkins’ authors.  If you want more, read the books.  If you want to stop in for a visit to 1930’s New York City and the fascinating people who lived and worked there, see the film, Genius.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to read….so many choices….

A Russian Classic Revamped: Anna Karenina

From the get-go and throughout, Anna Karenina was breathtaking. Bearing in mind that I read the novel only once several decades ago and am not a purist when it comes to Russian literature, I believe director Joe Wright and screenwriter Tom Stoppard’s conceit for telling this story reached the heart of the matter. Some political ramifications were doubtless lost (despite an early scene that looked as if it could have come from Dr. Zhivago), but it’s clearly the love story (and the fall-out therefrom) that counts in this version. Fittingly, the railroad plays a recurring role in the story of Anna Karenina, and it’s a marvelous vehicle — snow-covered, city to country, country to city, mixing people, gentry, serf, drones. It separates young lovers, then joins them, then separates again. Nothing’s more thrilling than a train ride through the movies.

The theatricality of the entire enterprise was a never-ending delight. I was hooked from my first sight of the stage, the bird’s eye view available from the upper levels of the theatre, characters looking down on the room they just left, and turning turning turning to walk out of the stage set into a field of whatever it is that Domhnall Gleeson’s Constantine Levin and his freed serfs scythe. Visually splendid are the actors as well, with the traffic-stopping Keira Knightley as Anna Karenina in stunning costumes by Jacqueline Durran. Costumes and settings and certainly Ms. Knightley’s jewelry did not adhere strictly to the time period any more than the ballroom dancing did, but who could care if beauty took a left turn for a joyride. The dancing in particular was fanciful and clever and quite possibly the way the lower classes might have imagined the upper classes to have moved in those overly ornate rooms, as if a luxurious birth afforded people grace and rhythm to do the complicated, flowing movements.

Jude Law as Karenin (c) 2012 Focus Features

Who hasn’t said, to themselves or aloud, that just a few years ago it would have been Jude Law as Vronsky, and wouldn’t that have been swell. Well, yes, but I’m happy to see him grow into the mature man he is, playing surprising roles for the joy of it. Jude Law does some of his very best work, subdued and thoughtful, as the properly repressed yet unalterably kind Alexei Karenin. Matthew Macfadyen put aside his often dour countenance to be a playful brother to Anna as the philandering Oblonsky. The wonderful Kelly Macdonald represented all women as betrayed wife Dolly. Her reaction to Anna’s behavior is yearning and admiring, in sharp contrast to the women of high society, exemplified by Shirley Henderson as an unknown woman at the opera, where everyone recognizes Anna. In contrast, Princess Myagkaya (an elegant Michelle Dockery) was empowered with the strength to be loyal.

Matthew Macfadyen as Oblonsky

Country fellow Levin loves the lovely Kitty (a sweet, sullen, then warm and tender Alicia Vikander), who is smitten with the dashing Vronsky (a seductive Aaron Taylor-Johnson), who dooms Anna Karenina as quickly as he falls for her. The lovely Ms. Knightley and delicious Mr. Taylor-Johnson are beautifully intertwined throughout the film.

Alicia Vikander as Kitty and Domhnall Gleeson as Levin

Emily Watson was morose as usual as Karenin’s friend, the Countess Ivanova. She represents her times well in its beginnings of forward-thinking actions by privileged classes, fighting for social equality for all except her own gender.

Mr. Wright’s direction is bold and exciting, aided by gorgeous cinematography by Seamus McGarvey, expert film editing by Melanie Oliver, an extraordinary production design by Sarah Greenwood that combined imagination and history, allowing the imagination to win. All of this was accompanied by a thrilling and moving score by Dario Marianelli.

As I left the theatre, I saw a poster for A Royal Affair and recognized Alicia Vikander who had just played the delightful Kitty. While that hadn’t been on my short list of films to see (isn’t winter swell, though, sending us indoors even in daylight to keep warm in the movie house?), but Ms. Vikander’s lustrous performance in Anna Karenina may yet move A Royal Affair up the list.

 If Anna Karenina is still playing on a big screen near you, go enjoy the visual splendor. If you’re a Russian literature purist, I can’t help you but to say it’s a fine film in and of itself. Read the book again later. Much later.

 ~ Molly Matera, signing off to read a good book….

The Boys Are Back

Sometimes it’s about expectations.  The current Sherlock Holmes franchise merely borrows the names and the most readily identifiable characteristics of its famous protagonists and almost-as-famous antagonist.  This 21^st century revamping is an action picture with a bit of bromance, inspired by steampunk graphic novels.  You know, where there are modern attitudes in the romanticized past with spectacular fireworks, explosions, lots of weapons, and a few attractive women thrown in the mix.  Is the plot a bit muddled?  Sure. Was a great plot on my list of expectations?  No.

Yes, the boys are back!  ((c) 2011 Warner Bros. Pictures)

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is a lot of fun.  It moves swiftly, if somewhat jumpily (it is Guy Ritchie directing, after all) into the jumbled plot.  There’s some espionage — or is it just business?  Or….OK, plot is not the film’s strength.

A Game of Shadows is, more than anything else, a witty and brisk buddy film.  Robert Downey Jr.’s brilliant, petulant, slightly mad Sherlock Holmes cannot do without his friend Dr. Watson, and Jude Law plays the long-suffering sidekick with grace, charm, and occasional exasperation.  These are Downey’s films, but the pairing with Jude Law is practically genius.

Downey as Holmes and Law as Watson  (c) 2011 Warner Bros. Pictures

The first film was a typical Ritchie romp in which men dominate and women are neglected at best.  It’s happened again here, but at least there’s a new female character, and I don’t mean Downey in drag.  Noomi Rapace plays Madame Simza, a gypsy fortune-telling reformed anarchist that Sherlock is determined to save despite herself.  That’s all of her, by the way.  Ms. Rapace brings nothing more to the role than disheveled hair.  

Rapace and the Boys (c) 2011 Warner Bros. Pictures

Mind you, I wasn't fond of Rachel McAdams as Irene Adler, even though I admire her work greatly elsewhere.  Hmmm.  Could the women be underwritten in these films?  Tosh.

This quest conflicts only slightly with Holmes’ attempt to protect Watson and his new bride-who-almost-wasn’t from the unscrupulous Professor Moriarty and right-hand-man Colonel Moran.  Moriarty is more and more interesting as Jared Harris plays him. Understatement is an understatement for what Harris does, and he pulls my attention away from Downey, which is no easy feat.  Perhaps it’s those cold eyes that freeze the blood.  Or his cold logic, which is difficult to argue with until you remember you’re a human.

Jared Harris as Professor Moriarty, and Downey.  (c) 2011 Warner Bros. Pictures.

While Harris actually gives Downey a run for his money, the main power of these films is the lusciously layered relationship between Downey’s Sherlock (or Sherley, as his brother Mycroft calls him) and Law’s Watson.  The two are so in synch, it’s gorgeous.  The looks that pass between them, and the eyes that don’t quite meet, speak volumes of their understanding.  And the dancing!  So don’t go thinking there won’t be a third “Sherlock Holmes and another adventure.”  Chemistry like this is priceless, and Messrs. Downey and Law and Ritchie are no fools.  Dr. Watson would make book on it.

The perversely delightful Stephen Fry appears in a very strange interpretation of brother Mycroft, sometimes in the nude.  Not full frontal as Michael Fassbender is purported to do in Shame, but quite enough to fluster Mrs. Watson and give us a few good laughs.

What with Ritchie’s penchant for replaying, in slow motion and voiceover, his lightning fast action scenes, there’s never a worry in the film.  When Sherlock does something absolutely dreadful, that should be shocking, we feel secure that it’s not an ending.  Only Moriarty ends things.  In lesser hands, this lack of suspense could be seen as a flaw.  But Ritchie does it all so skillfully that even knowing exactly where he’s going does not lessen the nail-biting, gasping audience from wondering Oh no, What Next???

As always, in her all-too-brief appearance Geraldine James is spot on as Mrs. Hudson, and Kelly Reilly has a bit more to do now that she’s married Dr. Watson.  More please.

Rachel McAdams makes a brief, nerve-wracking reappearance as Irene Adler. To say more would be a spoiler.  Which is, in itself, a spoiler….

Paul Anderson is chillingly efficient and loyal as Colonel Moran, stalwart of Professor Moriarty. 

And if all that weren’t enough, there’s a fantastical run through the woods with trees exploding around our heroes, rather like films showing Bastogne in the Battle of the Bulge.  Effects are awe-inspiring and James Herbert’s editing is sharp-edged.  All elements of this film are extremely well crafted, like cinematography by Philippe Rousselot and the production design by Sarah Greenwood, which is just gorgeous, and costumes by Jenny Beavan.  What the film may lack in plot it has in high production values.  Could it have been better?  Sure.  Will that keep me – or Ritchie, or Downey, or Law – up at night?  No.

Just to be clear:  You are not required or expected to think during this film.  You are not to wonder if it resembles the original stories.  Purists beware.  This is a new Holmes and Watson, a new way of looking at them, and it’s really all about Robert Downey Jr and the joy of watching him work.  So just have fun.

~ Molly Matera, signing off, already looking forward to the next one.  I freely admit to greatly enjoying this guiltily pleasurable franchise.