Why Novels Should Be Read

Rating: Null/10 (25 February 2011)

A good movie based on a novel should have the benefit of a clear back-story, and should be condensed down from the rich, layered characters and events that are the hallmark of great writing.
"The English Patient" has none of this. It's the kitchen-sink of motion pictures: every single plot line and detail from the novel seems to have made it to the screen, and it's unwieldy in size and over-reaching in scope.
Director Anthony Minghella seems to believe that he is telling a story of epic, Biblical proportions, which of course only serves to make the story LESS meaningful instead of more so. Ralph Fiennes and Kristin Scott Thomas (who is luminous, and the best thing about the movie) play completely unsympathetic characters... whereas a great love story will make you want to know the couple this affair makes you want to get away from these people as quickly as possible.
What drives these two together? It wasn't circumstance, or destiny, or the insanity of war, it was lust in the dust- adultery for adultery's sake. Their relationship "difficulties" then become very difficult to care about. Willem Dafoe shows up in a plot line that goes absolutely nowhere, and Juliette Binoche is Hana, the saintly nurse who feels the need- out of all the thousands of soldiers she's treated- to personally attend to this char-broiled buffoon, for reasons entirely unknown.
It was about an hour and-a-half into the film that Indian minesweeper Kip ties Hana into a harness, arming her with a lit flare to illuminate the paintings on the walls as he lifts her high into the air. This was ridiculous, completely out of a place, and an insult to an audience that had already surrendered WAY too much of their time. I've also never seen a movie with more manipulative sound editing... effects are over-exaggerated and inappropriately loud, and the songs feel like a cheap device to elicit emotion.
"The English Patient" is an example of why novels are condensed and shortened for filming, why certain characters and plot lines are cut, why the story is simplified. This is a movie made to win awards, not to entertain audiences.
GRADE: C-