Liam Neeson Meets the Other Man

Thanks to Oprah, Bernhard Schlink’s The Reader became the first German novel to reach the top spot on the New York Times bestseller list. It also became the basis for one of the most disappointing Best Picture Oscar nominees in recent years (but it still sold another sizable batch of copies in the process). In its wake, Richard Eyre and co-screenwriter Charles Wood have adapted The Other Man (trailer here), based a short story from Schlink’s Flights of Love collection. It opens in New York and Los Angeles this Friday (evidently without the benefit of a movie tie-in edition of Flights).

Peter and Lisa would seem to be a mismatched couple. He is a burley software mogul with an Irish temper. She is a successful, socially-outgoing high fashion shoe designer. Yet, their marriage works because of their mutual love. At least, that is what Peter thought. However, after fate cruelly takes Lisa from him (under circumstances initially kept deliberately vague), he starts to develop some nagging suspicions. For one thing, there is that password protected file on her laptop titled “love.” When Peter finally cracks the (glaringly obvious) code, he discovers pictures of her Latin lover in highly revealing poses.

Already reeling, the still-grieving Peter becomes further agitated when Ralph, the “other man,” tries to contact Lisa. When Ralph wildly misinterprets a she’s-not-here-so-don’t-bother-trying response from Peter, he decides to track down his wife’s lover for a face-to-face confrontation.

In Milan, he follows the suave Ralph (pronounced like Ralph Fiennes) to a chess club and challenges him to a friendly game (hmm, does this mean they are both “game-players?”). Hiding his true identity, Peter strikes up an ostensive friendship with his rival, while probing him for information and perhaps biding his time for the right opportunity to strike.

While Peter’s cat-and-mouse game might sound Hitcockian, Eyre completely de-emphasizes any potentially suspenseful elements in Other, preferring to concentrate on the angst and insecurities of the two men. Unfortunately, the dramatic situations frequently ring false, too often descending into dubious melodrama. However, he shrewdly exploits the romantic locales of Milan and Lake Como, which take on a glossy sheen through cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos’s lens.

Liam Neeson is an excellent actor when allowed to quietly simmer and slow boil. However, Eyre has him raging and acting out as the distraught Peter, rather than playing to his strengths. Though Antonio Banderas would sound perfectly cast as Ralph, his jittery mannerisms undercut his believability as the illicit lover.

Like The Reader, the implications of Other ultimately seem murky and contradictory. Lisa shared her darkest moments with Peter, yet the film possibly suggests it was Ralph who knew her best. Does Other imply there is as much lasting value in Ralph’s in-the-moment pleasures as Peter’s lifetime of fidelity? It is hard to say based on the evidence of the film.

Other is certainly a superior film to The Reader, but that is a low bar to clear. Eyre, the acclaimed director of Iris and Notes on a Scandal, has assembled the trappings of another high-brow literary drama, but somehow misfired with this story of grief and infidelity. It opens tomorrow (9/11) in New York at the Empire and Sunshine Theaters.

The Reader

Oprah Winfrey book club selections usually conform to a predictable formula. They largely feature female protagonists in rural settings, dealing with issues of abuse, addiction, and empowerment. This made Bernhard Schlink’s novel The Reader a bit of a ringer when it was selected, though one could argue victimization is an important element of the story. One of several Holocaust related films releasing this year in time for the Award season, director Stephen Daldry’s The Reader (trailer here) opens in New York today.

Schlink grew up as part of the German generation that came of age immediately following World War II. Entirely blameless themselves, they still had to come to terms with what their parents and teachers had done over the last twelve years. His surrogate in the film is the painfully sensitive Michael Berg, played as a post-war fifteen year-old by David Kross and as a present day middle-ager by a reserved Ralph Fiennes.

As the story begins, young Berg has contracted a rather nasty bug while riding the tram home from school. After vomiting in a strange courtyard, one of the residents takes pity on him, cleaning up and seeing him home safely. Upon recovering, Berg returns to thank the mysterious woman. Realizing the adolescent’s desire for her, the older woman embarks on a sexual relationship with Berg. Although she refuses to tell him her name, their affair falls into a regular pattern. Every day after school, he reads to her before they make love. Then one day, Berg comes to the apartment as usual, only to find she has cleared out without warning.

Though deeply hurt, Berg carries on with his studies, eventually enrolling in law school. There he signs up for an advanced course taught by the philosophical Professor Rohl. As part of their curriculum, they will observe the sensational war crimes trial of three women who worked as concentration camp guards for the SS. To Berg’s horror, he recognizes one of the accused as his former lover, one Hanna Schmitz.

In many ways, playwright David Hare’s screenplay is problematic. A great amount of time is spent on the Summer of ’42 set-up, effectively de-emphasizing the predatory nature of such a relationship. Things do pick up somewhat when the trial begins, largely thanks to the electric performance of veteran German actor Bruno Ganz as Rohl. When he is on-screen, the film’s IQ increases at least twenty points. However, the presence of such a character, a sixty-some year-old legal ethicist, raises a few unanswered questions, like what was he doing from about 1933 to 1945?

Ralph Fiennes largely appears as the older, emotional withdrawn Berg in order to frame the flashback sequences, sort of the English Patient without the bandages. In truth, Kate Winslet’s performance is quite accomplished, but in a way, that compounds the film’s problems. The more it humanizes her character, the more it seems to invite viewers to identify with an admitted war criminal and statutory rapist (at least in most states of the union).

Aspects of Berg’s actions as a law student are troubling also. Regardless of one’s feelings for Schmitz, he clearly allows a partial miscarriage of justice to stand. The character of Ilana Mather, the lone survivor of Schmitz’s atrocity, is also questionable. Portrayed by Lena Olin as a cold, wealthy Upper Easider, she seems deliberately drawn to be as unsympathetic as possible. However, she does have an important moment of moral clarity for the film when she reminds the middle-aged Berg he was also a victim of Schmitz.

Ultimately it is difficult to understand the moral center of the film or where it wants to lead the audience’s sympathies. Given the sensitive nature of the film’s subject matter, that is a bit of a problem. With so many Holocaust related films opening this season, it raises the stakes for a film like The Reader. While the film features excellent performances from Winslet and Ganz, as a whole, it is uneven and confused.

(On a related note: Inheritance airs on most PBS stations tonight. Review here.)