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Cinema
Releases - March 30, 2001
About
Adam
***
Certificate 15. 105 minutes. Written and directed
by Gerard Stembridge. Starring Stuart Townsend, Kate Hudson, Frances O'Connor,
Charlotte Bradley, Rosaleen Linehan.
Faithless
***
Certificate 15. 160 minutes. Directed by Liv
Ullman. Written by Ingmar Bergman. Starring Lina Endre, Krister Henrikkson,
Thomas Hanzon, Erland Josephson.
"Faithless" takes place in the secluded
home of an ageing Swedish filmmaker. He wants to write a story of adultery,
and conjures an imaginary woman to recite the story of her affair. Gradually
more figures pop onto the screen to dictate their testimony. And the ending
tells us what we had suspected all along -- the adulterous man was a
representation of the filmmaker himself, the woman a memory of his
lover.
This is a long, tortured journey of infidelity.
Scene after protracted scene we spend time with a husband, a wife and a friend,
witnessing dramatisations of happy days, dishonest days and an aftermath
of emotional hell. The 'interview' scenes are slow and agonising too -- every
question and answer hits nerves and opens wounds. Even the sex, performed
passionately and shown graphically, has undertones of danger, guilt and
pain.
"Faithless" is a draining experience because of
the excruciatingly drawn-out, matter-of-fact style, and the raw pain on the
faces of the actors. As drama per se, it is not as good as Louis Malle's
classic "Damage" (1992), but a little background knowledge gives it a lot
of extra poignancy: Not only do the characters in the film's drama represent
the writer in the framing device, but that writer represents legendary filmmaker
Ingmar Bergman, who wrote this screenplay. Furthermore, the director, Liv
Ullmann, is a long-time collaborator with Bergman, his one-time favourite
leading lady. We can feel the people behind the camera etching their souls
onto the screen.
.
On the day that "Faithless" opens, it would be
hard to find a more different movie about infidelity than "About
Adam", a bizarre comedy set in Dublin whereby Stuart Townsend woos
and agrees to marry Kate Hudson, while carrying on romances with her two
sisters and even enthralling her brother and the brother's girlfriend. Most
people change their personality just a little depending on who they're with,
for communicative effect -- here's a guy who seems to completely alter his
interests and manner to win over whoever he's looking at.
The film moves along quickly and breezily, with
montage, voice-over and a structure that shows us several people's points
of view. This light, eccentric tone in the face of obvious misdeeds gives
a feel of deliberate amorality, and it's strange fun. Here we have a story
that could have come across as mean-spirited, but Townsend's charm, the irony
of the storytelling, and the sex appeal of actors like Hudson and Frances
O'Connor, allow it to work as carefree comedy.
Charlotte Bradley plays the oldest of the three
sisters, a woman who sees right through Townsend and resists him for as long
as she can, before figuring what the hell, and agreeing to a mid-morning
quickie. Bradley is the conscience, or at least the sober voice, of the picture,
and asks Townsend near the end, "Why do you do it?"
"I like to give people what they want," he replies,
which is not a completely convincing answer, but why let logic interfere
at the eleventh hour?
COPYRIGHT©
2001 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
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