Thriller. Starring Dougray Scott, Kate Winslet, Saffron Burrows and Jeremy
Northam. Directed by Michael Apted. Written by Tom Stoppard. (R. 117 minutes.
At the Clay, Shattuck in Berkeley, Camera in San Jose, Guild in Menlo Park and
Century 5 in Pleasant Hill.)
Depressed by the end of a once-in-a-lifetime affair (and with baggy eyes
that announce his woeful condition), Tom Jericho still musters every ounce of
strength — and brain power — he has to help England crack the Nazis’ U-boat
code in “Enigma,” the sublime new film from director Michael Apted and a
consortium of other famous filmmakers.
“Enigma” is the name of the machine used by the Nazis to encrypt military
messages. It could also describe Jericho (Dougray Scott), a brilliant but
moody mathematician who’s obsessed with his luscious ex-paramour Claire
(Saffron Burrows), a code-breaking assistant who may have given secrets to the
Germans.
Claire is definitely enigmatic. Her sudden disappearance from Bletchley
Park, the code-breakers’ headquarters north of London, raises suspicions that
she’s a Nazi collaborator or was murdered by someone who is. With help from
Claire’s roommate, Hester (a studious-looking Kate Winslet in one of her
better performances), Jericho races to solve the clues that can save his
sanity and the fate of the Allies.
For most of its 117 minutes, “Enigma” delivers a powerful story from World
War II that’s based on real events. Tom Stoppard (working from Robert Harris’
best-selling novel) wrote the screenplay for “Enigma,” Lorne Michaels and Mick
Jagger produced it, and John Barry composed the music, rounding out the Who’s
Who of the film. Despite the romantic couplings portrayed in “Enigma,” this
isn’t a feel-good movie. It can’t be when one of its keys is the 1940 Katyn
massacre of Polish officers in western Russia. Instead, think of “Enigma” as a
cerebral thriller about the horror of war and the hope that people had in
spite of it.
Advisory: This film contains some nudity, violence and scenes of dead
bodies.
– Jonathan Curiel
‘SOME BODY’
Drama. Starring Stephanie Bennett. Directed by Henry Barrial. Written by
Bennett and Barrial. (Not rated. 77 minutes. At the UA Galaxy.)
Confessional gut-spilling — the kind that makes one want to turn away and
shout, “Stop! Stop! Too much information!” — is reaching new depths in “Some
Body,” a quasi-autobiographical tale of a young woman’s plunge into partying,
booze and recreational sex.
Co-writer Stephanie Bennett based this load of dirty laundry on a bad patch
in her own life, when she had ended a seven-year relationship and slept around
before saying “Enough.” A grade-school teacher and struggling actress in real
life, Bennett plays Sam, a grade-school teacher who dumps her boyfriend and
hits the emotional skids.
Sam is a mess, and Bennett’s decision to rehash her personal angst through
this character is a sad and astonishing thing. We see Sam sleeping with her
new neighbor the day she occupies a new apartment; harassing her ex and ex’s
girlfriend with nonstop telephone messages; weeping like a child when the ex
cuts off her visitation rights with his dog.
Bennett, I’m sure, had to summon a lot of courage to reveal herself so
nakedly, but “Some Body” smacks of exhibitionism more than it does cathartic
truth telling. Henry Barrial, Bennett’s director and co-writer, shot “Some
Body” on digital video in cinema verite style and heightened the film’s
reality factor by casting several of Bennett’s real-life ex-boyfriends as
variations of themselves.
Illuminations are rare — there’s a nice moment when Sam wonders why it’s
so hard for her to break up with people (”I must be nostalgic”) — but much of
the material is embarrassing.
“Some Body” is ambitious and risky and tries very hard to separate the raw
truth from the lies we tell ourselves. What is meant to be brave comes off as
gimmicky and immature.
– Edward Guthmann
‘THE LADY AND THE DUKE’
Drama. Starring Lucy Russell and Jean-Claude Dreyfus. Directed and written
by Eric Rohmer, from a book by Grace Elliott. (PG-13. 129 minutes. In French
with English subtitles. At the Lumiere, Camera in San Jose and Shattuck in
Berkeley.)
For the period drama “The Lady and the Duke,” director Eric Rohmer
(”Pauline at the Beach”) has digitally imposed actors onto canvases painted by
artist Jean-Baptiste Marot. It’s a fascinating concept, gorgeously rendered.
Seeing the paint actually dry, however, would probably be more fun than most
of this overly expository film.
Sometimes the digital manipulation looks like painting come to life,
sometimes like “Star Wars Episode II — Attack of the Clones,” with actors
resembling paper-doll cutouts. The conceit mostly works, though, with moving
images of people and horse-drawn carriages seamlessly weaved into two-
dimensional street scenes. When the close-ups reveal brush strokes, it’s oddly
exhilarating. You have to applaud Rohmer for trying this.
Unfortunately, most of the picture takes place away from the painted
cityscapes of revolutionary Paris, inside the drawing room of expatriate
Englishwoman Grace Elliott (Lucy Russell), a friend of Marie Antoinette. There,
she entertains her good friend and former lover, the Duke of Orleans (Jean-
Claude Dreyfus), the king’s cousin and political foe.
The pair talk only about politics. The movie’s dialogue contains little fat;
every word must provide historical context or advance the story
chronologically. Rohmer occasionally has some fun, like when a chambermaid
gloats, “Mr. and Mrs. Let-Them-Eat-Cake are goners,” but it’s mostly very dry
stuff.
Rohmer based the script on writings by Elliott, who married and divorced an
English nobleman and bore a son by the future King George IV before hooking up
with Orleans. Elliott made herself the heroine of her own story, with tales of
saving royal sympathizers from beheading and other acts of derring-do.
It’s hard to really get a bead on this woman. She’s attractive to men, sure,
and has royal connections, but she also left her daughter behind in England,
not exactly a noble act. Though Russell is a dynamic presence, her manner is
too forthright and modern for the character.
The movie springs to life with every appearance of Dreyfus as the duke. A
bull of a man in satin waistcoats, he shows the nobleman’s great affection for
Elliott and also his restraint when she goes off half-cocked about politics.
The duke supposedly left Elliott for somebody else, but he remains besotted
with her, his kisses of greeting lingering too long. At least that’s her
version.
Advisory: This film contains violence.
– Carla Meyer
‘THE MYSTIC MASSEUR’
Comedy-drama. Starring Aasif Mandvi and Ayesha Dharker. Directed by Ismail
Merchant. (PG. 118 minutes. At Bay Area theaters.)
“The Mystic Masseur,” based on V.S. Naipaul’s novel, re-creates a world and
a culture — Trinidad’s Indian community, circa 1950. Directed by Ismail
Merchant, best known as the producing half of the Merchant Ivory team, the
picture is filled with elegant camera moves and rich shots of the lush
surroundings. Too bad, then, that the pace is slow and the story neither takes
off nor arrives anywhere. In the end, one comes away wondering how exactly the
tale of the mystic masseur was worth recounting in the first place.
Still, for audiences with a particular interest in Trinidad or Indian
culture, the movie will have its appeal. It may also appeal to viewers in a
particular mood — relaxed, patient, not looking for drama but rather for a
sleepy, placid visit to a different time and place. I had mixed feelings about
“Mystic Masseur,” but there’s no denying that it has the integrity of a
committed and sincere piece of work.
The film benefits from the charismatic Aasif Mandvi in the title role. He
plays Ganesh, an exuberant and educated Indian man who wants to make it as a
writer. To support himself, he becomes a kind of healer/masseur and becomes a
power in his country. He’s not quite a fraud. He does seem to have some kind
of gift, and his customers do come away healed, if only of psychosomatic
illnesses.
“The Mystic Masseur” follows Ganesh’s life story and takes its time about
it, using an hour of screen time just for Ganesh to become a success as a
masseur. The film shows the influence one man’s optimism and dynamism can have
on a community and gives us a taste of Trinidad politics near the end of the
British colonial era. Though Ganesh is successful in a midlevel sort of way,
there’s nothing so striking or fascinating or metaphorically significant about
his career as to rate two hours of our attention.
– Mick LaSalle
