SWEPT FROM THE SEA A film review by David N. Butterworth Copyright 1998 David N. Butterworth
** (out of ****)
How could I not love "Swept from the Sea"?
First and foremost it's a love story, and I'm a sucker for one of those. It's also a period romance set in England, land of my birth, with the northern wilds of Yorkshire (county of my birth) doubling for some of the bleak, windswept Cornish locales. And it features a lush, romantic score by John Barry, the British composer whose music puts the icing on my proverbial cake. Heck, one of the dialogue coaches--Sandra Butterworth--even bears my name.
So did I love it? I did not.
That's too bad, because "Swept from the Sea" is far from unwatchable. The scenery is quite spectacular--Dick Pope's cinematography brings the typically wet English locations to life, from surf pounding against the craggy, desolate cliffs to rain pelting down on the tiny coastal village. The actors are equally attractive (I didn't say wet). Not just the leads, Vincent Pérez and Rachel Weisz, but the supporting performers too--Ian McKellen, Joss Ackland, and Kathy Bates. Very colorful. And then there's the music, of course. Full, rich, and evocative. Typical Barry.
Part of the problem is the story. It's just not much of one. Based on a short story by Joseph Conrad, "Swept from the Sea" tells the tale of Yanko, the soul survivor of an immigrant vessel bound for "A-may-reeka" that flounders off the Cornish coast, and Amy Foster, the servant girl with whom he falls in love. Amy is an outcast and the townsfolk are mean to Yanko because they don't like his "But I've just been shipwrecked, dammit!" looks or understand his balmy accent. But that's about it. Did I mention it's a *short* story? There's not enough plot to flesh out the film's overly long running time.
Fortunately we've got Cornwall to look at and Barry's score to listen to.
Amy is distant and aloof, a spurned free spirit who uses silence as a defense mechanism. She likes to dance in the rain and wade through tidepools looking for stuff for her collection, kind of like Ariel in "The Little Mermaid." The locals think she's simple, or simply crazy. Amy does a lot of staring and mopes around without saying very much but it doesn't make for blistering drama. Yanko, too, is distant and aloof and the silent type but because he's foreign, a traveler from a remote region of the Carpathian mountains. This makes relating to the young lovers a bit of a challenge since empathizing with or even understanding them is difficult.
Pérez and Weisz aren't exactly household names and are unlikely to become such on the strength of "Swept from the Sea." They both turn in creditable performances, but the characters they play seem strangely devoid of passion; their love never really ignites on screen, it smolders a little, then goes out. Director Beeban Kidron should have thrust them together more often; their one erotic scene together--in Amy's secret grotto--is awkwardly handled, as if the actors themselves felt embarrassed.
I did enjoy McKellen's role, as the doctor who befriends Yanko and improves his own chess game in the process. (Aha! Yanko must be *Russian*, Dr. Kennedy explains when Yanko shows him a move or two. Russians are most excellent chess players.) Mad. Russian. What's the diff? Ackland and Bates offer predictably staunch support but, sadly, there's not much meat here.
-- David N. Butterworth Computing & Information Technology SCHOOL OF MEDICINE dnb@mail.med.upenn.edu
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