“Tess” (1979)
Thomas Hardy‘s 1891’s novel “Tess of the d’Urbervilles” was the last novel that Sharon Tate gave Roman Polanski before her untimely death, and while that would hint at an especially personal project, “Tess” isn’t nearly as moving or stirring as, say, Polanksi’s personal meditation on his WW2 experiences (evinced in “The Pianist”). In many ways, this story about a strong-willed peasant girl (a luminous Nastassja Kinski) whose simple farmer father discovers that they have aristocratic connections by way of an old surname– which leads her on a lengthy journey of some highs, mostly lows and heartbreaking tragedy — is Polanski’s “Barry Lyndon,” and at a distended two hours and fifty two minutes, it sprawls in a similar manner, but is a much lesser effort. Ultimately a pessimistic film about the illusions we search in vain for, when Tess goes to work for her wealthy cousin as a way to earn status and help her poor family, she quickly discovers the family title he possesses is essentially fraudulent and worthless. Making matters worse, her overly-amorous cousin rapes her, and her sickly bastard child (who soon dies) destroys her already tenuous claim to nobility. Shamed, she returns to basic peasant life at a dairy farm and then meets another suitor who thinks she’s unspoiled. Sadly, whenever Tess’ bleak life is illuminated by a rare ray of hope, through love, perhaps, her dreams are quickly shattered by the harsh realities of life. Classically well-made, and well-received, nominated for six Academy Awards (including Best Director and Best Picture), “Tess” is a rather depressing and cold almost-three-hour watch that hardly ranks among Polanski’s best. [C+]
“Pirates” (1986)
You might think you know the trajectory of Polanski’s career, but you need to take a closer look to fully understand the head-scratching, self-destructive follow-up choices he made, which make his filmography read like ‘masterpiece, disaster, hit, disaster…’ etc. While “Rosemary’s Baby” is a horror classic, he followed that up with the terribly uneven “Macbeth” and the outre, absurdist comedy “What?“. Then came “Chinatown,” showing him at the peak of his powers, which was followed by the awesome, but totally gonzo psychological freak-out, “The Tenant.” The drama “Tess” would put Polanski back in the graces of critics and the Oscars, but then he would wait nearly seven years for his what is probably his most egregious plot-losing venture, “Pirates.” If one is looking for the textbook definition on how not to make a swashbuckling adventure picture, this is it. Perhaps the film’s biggest mistake is the cast. Watching Johnny Depp’s charming fey pirate in the ‘Caribbean’ movies, even the bad ones, grossly underlines how miscast in the lead Walter Matthau is. The rest of the ensemble — Frenchman Cris Campion, Charlotte Lewis, Olu Jacobs and Damien Thomas are a charisma-free motley crew. Shot on location in Tunisia, using a full-sized pirate vessel constructed for the production, the picture was a massive financial and critical failure and deservedly so. While Polanski-ites will enjoy some of its loopy charms and questionable choices — two comical rape sequences are beyond bad taste — the picture is incontestably inert, though Philippe Sarde’s score must be applauded for imbuing its unmoored meanderings with a weak pulse. The picture reportedly cost $40 million at the time and grossed around $1.65 million in return. It’s never been on DVD in the U.S. and there’s never been a remotely plausible argument to remedy that situation. [D+]
“Frantic” (1988)
When Harrison Ford and Roman Polanski teamed up for “Frantic,” both were in need of a hit. The former was coming off “The Mosquito Coast,” a project he deeply believed in that didn’t quite do the box office he had hoped. Meanwhile, Polanski was still reeling from the disastrous “Pirates” a high-seas folly that was threatening to cannonball his career. With that in mind, the fantastic opening of “Frantic” is all the more satisfying: as a car whips down a freeway, the audience stares out the windshield while the credits scroll by, backed by Ennio Morricone’s phenomenal, slightly off-center score, and it’s not long before we know we’re headed into a story where nothing is what it seems and everything in sinister. A breakdown on the side of the highway portends something disastrous, but the actual moment when the plot is set in motion is wonderfully innocuous. In a Paris hotel, Dr. Richard Walker is taking a shower after a long flight and getting ready for breakfast in bed, and maybe a little more, with his wife Sondra (Betty Buckley). The camera pulls into the shower and looks out into the bedroom where Sondra tries to tell something to Richard, who can’t hear her, and she exits the room. And that’s the last both Richard and the audience will see of her. And so begins a film that for 90 minutes is a wickedly entertaining Euro-flavored thriller with a strong hint of Hitchcock. Richard begins a dizzying, surreal journey into the underbelly of Paris to find his missing wife, and each person he meets is, it seems, a possible conspirator. His quest expands to involve Emmanuelle Seigner, who, like every young, sexy Frenchwoman in a movie, has her own agenda, and everything is going thrillingly, until the film shifts into its final act, when it suddenly becomes everything it has so strenuously avoided being until then. The carefully measured, eerie mystery gives way to car chases and gun battles, with a MacGuffin that has not aged very well at all. No surprise to hear, then, that studio meddling shortened the movie by fifteen minutes and forced a new ending to be shot. And for all that effort, the film was a disappointment for both Ford and Polanski at the box office. We’ll always wonder what Polanski had originally planned for the finale, but in “Frantic” we get 2/3rds of a thriller that still bests entire movies in the genre. [B]
“Bitter Moon” (1992)
Almost like a riff on his debut “Knife in the Water,” and as overblown as that film is immaculate, “Bitter Moon” was, like many films in what we’ll call Polanski’s mid-period, poorly received on release, but it has become something of a cult item since. With some films, like “The Tenant,” that reevaluation is entirely justified, we’re not sure “Bitter Moon” warrants it. While it’s fascinating in spots, but the director’s worst tendencies are at the forefront, and no amount of mischievous humor can turn it into a neglected gem. Repressed couple Hugh Grant and Kristin Scott-Thomas are holidaying on a cruise when they encounter wheelchair-bound Oscar (Peter Coyote) and his younger wife Mimi (Emmanuelle Seigner, Polanski’s wife, which lends a distinctly disturbing note to her casting). The latter pair are locked in a destructive, sado-masochistic relationship, and soon poison their new friends with sexual invitations, and the memories of their relationship together. The director’s investigation into perversion is fitfully interesting, but it mostly seems that Polanski is trying to provoke and needle, like his “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf“-esque couple, rather than to really get to the heart of the matter. It doesn’t help that, while most of the ensemble are strong, Grant is miscast and adrift, excuse the pun, even taking into account that the film came long before his star persona was established. There’s campy fun to be had with “Bitter Moon,” but for the most part, it’s but a shadow of the better works from the filmmaker. [C-]
