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Love In The Time Of Cholera
Cast: Javier Bardem, Giovanna Mezzogiorno, Benjamin Bratt, Liev Schreiber, John Leguizamo, Fernanda Montenegro, Catalina Sandino
Moreno, Unax Ugalde
Directed by Mike Newell
Screenplay: Ron Harwood, based on the novel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Cinematography: Affonso Beato
Music: Antonion Pinto
Running time: 2 hours 8 minutes
A man is destined to be a helpless, single-minded romantic for his entire life. The author of this exceptional fantasy character,
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, carries the notion to extremes, mining the concept for all the irony, comedy and tragedy it suggests.
But, while the novel that's so rich in cultural and internal detail ensures its long life on the literary landscape, the adaptation
to the visual realisation of it as a generational saga by screenwriter Ronald Harwood (The Pianist, Being Julia) and director
Mike Newell (Four Weddings And A Funeral, Donnie Brasco, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire) presents difficulties to those
for whom romantic exaggeration might seem more ludicrous than endearing. It is essential that the viewer engages with the
culture of the setting. Florentino Ariza's destiny is sealed during his teenage years (played by Unax Ugalde) with his first
look at the beautiful Fermina Daza, a lovely young woman living in a house well above his modest station in life as a telegraph
operator. Given to poetry and florid letter writing, his written songs to Fermina win her heart and she accepts his proposal
to marry. His mother is overjoyed, but when her obnoxious father Lorenzo (John Leguizamo) catches wind of it he's less than
pleased with her choice. A widower, he has brought her to Cartagena in order to attract a suitably high and elegant marriage.
He spirits her off for a year to effect her forgetfulness, a length of time that Florentino considers no problem at all.
It's merely a blip for a love that knows no time. However, it's not for him alone to decide. When she does return, she doesn't
contact him, a sign he ignores. But we pick up on her decision to please her father by detaching herself from a man with such
humble prospects. Even her cold dismissal of Florentino's ardour for resuming their relationship doesn't diminish him, or
his dedication to his vow.
During an outbreak of cholera, Fermina takes ill, alarming father Lorenzo. When the eminent Doctor Juvenal Urbino (Benjamin
Bratt) examines her, part of his procedure is to hold his ear to her bare and beautiful chest in order to listen to her heartbeat.
When the super-confident, perfectly attired doctor declares that it's not the dreaded disease but a minor illness, the joy
everyone feels is celebrated. At the same time, the doctor has been struck with another sort of illness, and it's not long
before he formally asks for Fermina's hand in marriage, bringing great joy and fulfillment to Lorenzo's dream.
Perhaps not so much for Fermina's, though she takes full advantage of the lavish life style he provides, beginning with
an extended honeymoon on the continent. Florentino, now a young adult (played in his later years by the utterly brilliant
Javier Bardem), recovers from disappointment, resolving to simply to wait a bit longer. Fermina is as dedicated to the preservation
of an increasingly cold marriage as Florentino is dedicated to her. Walking home one night, a woman's arm reaches out and
pulls Florentino inside a building. In a fitful scene of quick, frantic lust, this seduction opens up a whole new world to
our groom-in-waiting, who finds in it the key to women's hearts and desires. He begins a diary of his conquests which, by
the time he reaches his later years will number well over six hundred. He has become a seduction machine that seems to defy
age, not a bad way to divert one's mind from a forestalled consummation of one's only true love. If it wasn't fiction, it
would earn a certain entry for the record books, Casanova and other heroes of the love bed notwithstanding.
But sexual conquest isn't his only diversion. Owing his job to rich uncle Don Leo (Hector Elizondo), he appeals to the
man for a job that might allow him also to enjoy the comforts of wealth. Don Leo, after some resistance to his nephew's request,
employs him as an assistant in his riverboat business as a start to his career path.
The film is entirely in English, with all actors rendering Spanish accents with varying degrees of ability. There was
certainly a need for a dialogue coach on this set. Notable appearances are those of Catalina Sandino Moreno as Fermina's protective
companion and enabler, Fernanda Montenegro as Transito, Florentino's scrappy mother, the spicy tarts, and Marcela Mar as the
last of his sexual playthings who share with us their bountiful endowments.
Unfortunately, the performances of Bratt, Leguizamo and Elizondo are rather weak, at best. They lack the interpretive
depth to lift their characters beyond stereotype. Bardem, on the other hand, adds yet another reason to regard him as one
of the most distinguished screen presences of his generation. While not yet emerging from limited recognition, mostly from
his masterful performances in films such as The Sea Inside and The Dancer Upstairs, his appearances in two major films (this
one and his hugely-deserved best supporting actor Oscar for No Country For Old Men) on opposite ends of the character spectrum
will now bring him the wide recognition his talent demands.
On the soundtrack by Antonio Pinto there are exquisitely stylized songs by Latin sensation Shakira! Her material, created
for this film and well outside her standard repertoire, are the bolero, "Hay Amores" and the Incan, folkloric "Despedida"
sung in a gutsy, suggestive range with ornamental inflections, an effect called melisma, that would make it a show stopper
were it not for its contribution to the atmosphere and sensuality on screen. Marquez' encouragement in bringing her aboard
for the benefit of the story's carnal theme tells you something about his involvement with the production.
However this satirical vision of love and romance in 19th century Cartagena, Colombia works for you, there's no doubt
that all involved should take great pride in being associated with a film derived from a major work by a Nobel Prize winning
author. With humour extending over the local and universal human condition, and deliberate surrealism, this will bring pleasure
to anyone interested in great literary originality. The film, if it accomplishes nothing else, exposes his slyly powerful
work to a potentially broader readership.
The essence of the original is captured with enough fidelity to pay homage to it even if the magical mist between romantic
obsession and hilarious satire that Marquez holds you in with the written word is missing. The is quite long granted and the
attentions to ageing may play awkwardly for some, but the idea that who we are and how we love are unaffected by the process
of growing old, as Florentino writes to Fermina in the last act of their lives, is a theme that should resonate across cultural
borders. Artfully couched in an envelope of surreal absurdity, its ironies are designed to question the contradictions and
weaknesses of entrenched traditions. All reason enough to see and enjoy this significant film which I greatly enjoyed.
U23D
Directed by Catherine Owens and Mark Pellington
Produced by John Modell, Catherine Owens, John Shapiro, Peter Shapiro
With: U2 - Bono, Adam Clayton, Larry McMullen Jr., The Edge
Running time: 85 mins
I've never been entirely convinced by U2. I find great difficulty in assessing what it was that made them so eminent, and
the subsequent veneration of them as golden gods. The tiresome dogma that accompanies their every record and the scunnersome
sight of seeing lead singer Bono (no shades indoors boyo) sitting next to world leaders, peering out from behind his tinted
face-furniture on the front page of every newspaper. If there was a choice to be made, the glorious John Peel got it right
with the Undertones as the best Irish band, cheeky boys from the north who, despite "The Troubles" in their homeland,
sang about summertime and girls, not politics. I2, wanted to say to U2, "Play 'One' and shut the fuck up about Africa."
Politics and music however, have always been pals, and music is the ideal media by which to communicate radical ideas
in sensible, danceable ways. Despite my misgivings about U2, I understand this. I acknowledge what it's like to love a band
so much that it changes opinions about the world. I also know what it was and still is to be one in a crowd, swept up in the
maelstrom, to jump up and down alongside strangers who had become comrades by the very nature of mutual devotion to the music.
I've been to gigs where the only reasonable response to the inspirational pop/rock symphonies blaring out of the speakers
was to spontaneously weep with a mixture of joy and sadness. I know all this and yet I didn't overly care for U2 and no iPod
ads or radio airplay could ever adjust my attitude.
However, cinematically U23D is a triumphant concert film that actually feels like a real concert rather than just a bunch
of live songs strung together for the benefit of hardcore fans, or worse a slavishly adoring tribute flick in which all involved
slabber over each other for being brilliant.
Recorded over 9 concerts in Latin America and one in Australia, U23D is the first film to utilize IMAX, 3-D, and multi-camera
technology for a concert. While this use of new tools could have easily been badly bungled with cheesy bells and whistles,
3-D effects are used only to create and successfully sustain the cinematic illusion rather than dismiss the reality altogether.
Credit must go to editor Oliver Wicki for a job remarkably well done, as the disparate performances are sewn together so masterfully
that only a particularly clatty looking Bono's constantly changing jackets reveal the seams.
The film opens with a breathless tour through the halls of the venue, as people begin pouring through the turnstiles and
running to their seats. The band kicks off an hour and a half set with 'Vertigo', their 2004 hit from 'How to Dismantle an
Atomic Bomb'. U2 then proceed to tear down the house with epic renditions of songs from their back catalogue, all of which
are delivered with ecstatic and it has to be said, at times ponderously pompous zeal. The result though is a thrilling hour
and a half ride that literally fits the viewer with conceptual goggles and transports them to the centre of a U2 concert circa
2006. Wisely forgoing the usual concert film rituals of backstage interviews and retrospectives, U23D keeps the focus where
it belongs: on the music. The camera swoops and swirls around the band, sometimes giving us a bird's eye or cheap seats' view,
other times taking the low angled view, letting us gaze up at the band as though we are standing at the foot of the stage.
When the camera pans out over the massive crowd pogoing in time to the beat, one truly understands what Led Zeppelin called
"The Ocean".
U2 themselves are exciting performers who command attention in non-confrontational ways. Although the venue they are playing
is massive, the film seems intimate. Co-director Catherine Owens, long time art director for the band's live shows, truly
understands the dynamics of a U2 concert and uses her experience to illuminate the universal appeal of the band. Owens with
partner Mark Pellington portrays the band, maybe not as they are, but as their audience sees them. For a concert film, this
is exactly the right approach. Their structure is so engrossing that at times during the film I kept tilting my head to see
around the bonce in front of me.
Even if you're not a U2 fan, you'll be surprised how many of the songs you. Their sound is unique and they own it. The
viewer cannot help but be swept up by the band's high energy and the exhilarating response of the crowd they are playing for.
It is clear that both groups are having a blast and the camaraderie infectious. However it wouldn't have mattered how good
the band's performance was if the film itself was badly put together. Without the loving ministrations of Wicki, Owens, and
Pellington, U23D may have simply been a failed experiment in concert films.
Though sometimes pious, bombastic and preachy, U2's credos are backed with a seemingly genuine humanism that resonates
on a global level. Of course, their music is occasionally still saccharine: I will always find 'Beautiful Day' so earnest
it gives me the dry boak, but the band's sincerity cannot be questioned. By the end of U23D, I truly felt like I had attended
a U2 concert. The true feat of these filmmakers is the way they have used burgeoning technology to take reality and make it
better and even more realistic, which is what great films always do.
During 'Sunday Bloody Sunday', which possibly contains the greatest military inspired drumbeat since Jefferson Airplane's
'White Rabbit', Bono breaks the 4th wall. Thanks to the 3D, his little podgy hand reaches out towards the viewer, his head
tipped sideways. "Wipe your tears", he says. At that moment, sitting in the cinema surrounded wholly by sound and
picture, my eyes blurred, a sensation I attributed to the awkward pseudo rayban plastic 3D glasses distributed to audience
members. Or was I experiencing the dreaded horrors that Bono was getting too close for comfort?
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