DEJA VU
Reviewed by Harvey Karten, Ph.D. Rainbow Film Co./ Revere Entertainment Director: Henry Jaglom Writer: Henry Jaglom, Victoria Foyt Cast: Stephane Dillane, Victoria Foyt, Vanessa Redgrave, Glynis Barber, Michael Brandon, Vernon Dobtcheff, Graydon Gould, Noel Harrison
Only connect!...Only connect the prose and the passion and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height." Did Henry Jaglom say this, or are we experiencing deja vu while we watch his latest offbeat--though accessible-- film about the nature of romance and love? Utilizing his wife Victoria Foyt in the principal role, Jaglom has fashioned a film with mystical undertones as a meditation on some heavy themes: destiny vs. free will, compromise vs. burning bridges, the pull of history vs. the allures of the present. If he doesn't quite succeed in realizing his ambition it is only because he is tackling exalted subjects, but "Deja Vu" features some solid if sometimes pretentious dialogue, intense performances, and some lush scenery from the majesty of Jerusalem to the beauty of Paris; from the richness of the white cliffs of Dover to the coziness of a London cottage.
The story opens as a store owner from Los Angeles, Dana (Victoria Foyt), is shopping for garments in Jerusalem for sale in her business. An elderly, enigmatic French woman (Akiva Marks) sits beside her in a scenic cafe and, opening up the way strangers often do to reveal secrets unknown even by their most intimate friends, she describes a liaison she had decades earlier with an American lover who gave her a ruby pin, left for home with a promise to send for her, and simply disappeared.
There ensues a progression of incidents that take Dana to Paris, to Dover's white cliffs, to London and ultimately home to Los Angeles, but before meeting her fiance, Alex (Michael Brandon) in London, she has a fateful meeting in Dover with Sean (Stephen Dillane) whom she observes painting a pretty scene and finds herself not only attracted to the urbane fellow but having the strangest feeling that they'd met before. By a remarkable coincidence, business draws both Dana and Sean to a London home where they are hosted by a comical pair with their own stories to tell, and are entertained by the host's sister, Skelly (Vanessa Redgrave). Skelly is a woman of the world who believes in taking life by the horns and refusing to compromise even if one must give up security in favor of a brash romance.
While Jaglom's latest effort is more structured than his autobiographical films such as "Can She Bake A Cherry Pie" (which furthered Karen Black's acting career) and "New Year's Day" which featured the director himself in a starring role, he continues to compete with the French penchant for talk. As with his most recent offering, "Last Summer in the Hamptons," which focused on a group of theater people talking up a storm to reveal all their neuroses, Jaglom seats his characters in the central scene around a living room where they tell campfire-like stories about their lives, one of which hits home so thunderously that Dana and her secret paramour Alex seem ready to crawl under a table.
The fable relies all too much on unbelievable coincidences to demonstrate that we poor mortals are often blown hither and thither by fate, our decisions made for us by some all- knowing entity which can disrupt our most solid plans and sweep us away to romantic bliss. There is little doubt that the pathetic philistine Alex is no competition for the dashing Sean (Stephen Dillane) whose English manners, aesthetic sense, and savoir faire wholly outmatch the boorish materialism of Dana's fiance. Dillane takes high honors for his finely-honed acting while Vanessa Redgrave is surprisingly underutilized and cast in a stereotypical role of a woman who is simply a type. Vanessa Redgrave's own mother has a banal cameo as an aging parent who is not wanted by either of her children, while Victoria Foyt is well cast as a sophisticated career woman overwhelmed by destiny.
Few movies have put a single song to such use, giving the audience a feeling of instant deja vu, as the refrains of "White Cliffs of Dover" is repeated interminably to illuminate the movie's title: "It seems we've stood and talked like this before/ We looked at each other in the same way then/ But I can't remember Where Or When." Not Rated. Running time: 115 minutes. (C) Harvey Karten 1998
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