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Friday, February 26, 2010

MOVIE REVIEW
The Ghost Writer
Eyes Wide Askance, In Polanski's Gem

Kim Cattrall as Amelia Bly in Roman Polanski's superb thriller "The Ghost Writer", which today expanded its release to Chicago and San Francisco among other U.S. cities. 
Summit Entertainment

By Omar P.L. Moore/PopcornReel.com        Follow popcornreel on Twitter FOLLOW 
Friday, February 26, 2010

Crafted as both magnificent illusion and icy political thriller, "The Ghost Writer" is an impressive work by Roman Polanski, who brilliantly directs this film.  Set on Cape Cod, Mr. Polanski's Berlinale-winning film features an impressive cast, brooding atmosphere and good dialogue, from a script by the director and Robert Harris, based on the latter's best-selling book The Ghost.

Retired British Premier Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) has been charged with war crimes in connection with the Iraq invasion, with obvious parallels to Tony Blair's political contretemps.  Lang is intelligent but trivial.  Lacking substance, led by vanity and trapped by the constraints of power, he's essentially an empty suit on auto-pilot.  His wife Ruth (excellent work by Olivia Williams) is cynical and suspicious of him, a member of the Jenny Sanford school of stand-by-your-man.

Lang is surrounded by his chief of staff Amelia Bly (Kim Cattrall) and entourage of handlers who shuttle him away from political rivals like his former cabinet secretary Richard Rycart (Robert Pugh), a not-so veiled reference to the former British foreign secretary Robin Cook, who was found dead in 2005, shortly after resigning, a vociferous opponent of the British collaboration to invade Iraq.  A writer (Ewan McGregor) has been hired to ghost write the embattled prime minister's memoirs, which requires intrepid detective work.  (Ah, a writer's dream, to be self-activated enough to write the missing gaps in history!  What power!)  Mr. McGregor brings an everyman's caution to a film where reality is tinged with doubt and the landscape feels incomplete.

The earthy cinematography by Pawel Edelman blends an at-sea and uncertain terrain with cold-hearted certitude.  There's often a stark contrast in visuals in a shot, lending eerie disorientation to time and place, especially at the Cape Cod beach house where strategy is devised.  All the drama percolating within the bowels of each of the film's players -- some dubious, others deadly -- are reflected exclusively in their eyes.  A shiftiness.  A withering stare.  A calculated look, glance or rudimentary examination.  The masterful score by Alexandre Desplat heightens the tension lurking within this cool, noir-like film.

Mr. Polanski styles this mystery superbly, from moment one to the final hurrah.  There's intelligence, deliberation and an adult sensibility in each situation.  There's not a single minute where we're disengaged.  The director punctuates the mood with silences, pauses and spatial perception, each indispensible to the scene at hand.  Each scene is meticulously rendered.  For example: look extremely closely at the books on the shelf located at the right of the picture above.  Note Ms. Cattrall's elbow is resting between the titles of two black books: Cooking The Microwave Way and The Occult.  That latter title is no doubt a cheeky reference to the director's own film "Rosemary's Baby". 

The director also gives a subtle tip of the hat to Ms. Cattrall's man-eating, material-hungry Samantha Jones from "Sex And The City".  In the film's latter stages Amelia is seen looking into a make-up mirror.  The symbol on it is unmistakable, even to the casual observer: Chanel.

Riveting, exciting and pulsating, each episode in "The Ghost Writer" is crafted like a suspenseful page-turning potboiler of a drama.  Subtle visual cues are flashed to the audience.  On second viewing they will be glaring.  The screenplay is an A to B straight line, never shortchanging the moviegoer, even when minor narrative expediencies occur.

"The Ghost Writer" is about being on trial as much as anything, and each character gets to testify.  It's smart filmmaking with a sly sense of humor that undeniably serves as a parallel to Mr. Polanski's own recent predicament.


With: Timothy Hutton, Robert Hugh, Tom Wilkinson, James Belushi, Eli Wallach.


"The Ghost Writer" is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association Of America for language, brief nudity/sexuality, some violence and a drug reference.  The film's duration is two hours and eight minutes.

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Unscripted review of "The Ghost Writer":




Read more movie reviews and stories from Omar here.

Read Omar's "Far-Flung Correspondent" reports for America's pre-eminent Film Critic Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times - here



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