Complex and rewarding

Rating: 7/10 (1 May 2010)

The theme of the authentic life was intellectually popular it the Fifties. Existentialism made it a movement: Sartre and De Beauvoir explored it: in her case more successfully, as she is a better writer.
This film depends on the leads and DiCaprio has this in the bag: his performance is just ideal, a mix of hope and rage, He looks and sounds the part. Winslett is fine as April but her character is very complex and almost too ambiguous to really understand. She speaks in a strange and restrained manner which withholds her from the action. That is not to say it is wrong, but rather it is unusual in movie terms.
In fact Winslett's April Wheeler is the crux of the story. It's hard to know whether their marriage is bad anyway, or if moving to Paris will solve anything. April Wheeler has creative instincts as shown early on by acting in a play, which are frustrated. Husband Frank Wheeler is like thousands of people who say they have a novel inside them but in fact they concede their vague and possibly vain ambitions by increments as they manage day to day life.
It is a shame that this story ends badly as if they, and no one, can ever win the battle to escape the 'burbs, the job, the predictable and inauthentic business life.
The device in this story of having a 'crazy person' tell the truth serves a plot purpose but is not very stylish in 1961, when the book was published.. Shakespeare used it, in having the fool tell kings about reality.
Deakins's photography and Mendes's guidance are superb, the tone is right, as are the production qualities too. This film will provoke thoughts for a long time after.