GUINEVERE
Reviewed by Harvey Karten Miramax Films Director: Audrey Wells Writer: Audrey Wells Cast: Sarah Polley, Stephen Rea, Jean Smart, Gina Gershon, Paul Dooley
Some time back Diogenes searched high and low in his part of Greece, looking fruitlessly for an honest man. If he were alive today, he'd probably search another lifetime for a middle-aged man who has never entertained a fantasy about a relationship with a 20-year-old woman (or man, depending). For guys who live strictly in a fantasy world, there's nothing like a solid movie for an awesome vicarious experience of that specifically human fancy. "Guinevere" realizes the vision better than any other film has done this year to date. "Guinevere," which is both written and debut-directed by Audrey Wells ("The Truth About Cats and Dogs") is a remarkable accomplishment, ministering to our need for a mature film filled with humor and pathos. The cast is a crackerjack ensemble of actors with Stephen Rea as 40- something bohemian photographer Connie Fitzpatrick and Sarah Polley as Harper Sloane, his 20-year old lover and devotee. "Guinevere," a slickly-made yet incisively-drawn portrait of a May-September romance, was a hit at last January's Sundance Festival, featuring much higher production values than the typical indie programmed in that Utah showplace each year.
Particularly appealing are the shades and nuances of feeling experienced by the two principals, each of whom has ambiguous feelings about the affiliation while both are unquestionably gaining impressively from their connection. Essentially this is a story of a young woman just out of college who is the oddball in her haute bourgeois family, has no idea what she's good at or even whether she has potential, and who is culled right out of her husk by an older man who showers attention and enlightenment on her. As she transforms from a shy, antisocial individual who despite her beauty may never have had a boy friend to a romantically fulfilled and professionally competent human being, she is in turning contributing a great deal of gratification to the roue who has taken her in and given her a life.
The affair begins as ruggedly good-looking wedding photographer Connie Fitzpatrick (Stephen Rea) plies his trade at the plush wedding of Harper's sister. After spotting a candid and particularly penetrating picture of herself, Harper visits the photographer at his bohemian digs in a run-down San Francisco neighborhood and is seduced by his seemingly passive but obviously confident invitation to spend the night. Moving in with the man after experiencing the joys of both the flesh and the mind, Harper is prodded to study the field that interests her the most and is plied with books, attention, and the company of Connie's artistic friends. Awkward at first (at one point she spills wine on a stack of Connie photos but is told "That's OK, I've got another bottle"), she soon develops all the grace of a assured, fulfilled woman. By the end of the affair, both parties have obviously grown emotionally, both delighting in each other's company and riding out the inevitable periods of friction and rage.
Audrey Wells excels in both direction and scripting, especially in getting Harper to convey nuances of emotion by simple frowns, pouts, and subtle twists of her necklace. Wells also jackets the film in a variety of moods, most striking in the concluding moments when she converts Connie's studio into a surreal vision of heavenly light. The director charges the movie with witty dialogue throughout, in one showstopping scene presenting a knockout demonstration of putdowns from the lips of Harper's mom, Deborah (Jean Smart), who sharply and amusingly challenges the artist's ability to relate to a mature, experienced woman. (One writer who was present at Sundance exclaimed that this scene "brought the house down.")
Wells peppers the story with the little gestures that mean so much in turning what could have been yet another romance into a compelling, believable story. There's the entirely hilarious rich mom played with pizazz by Jean Smart who instructs the family not to bother asking for Harper's opinions at the dinner table: "Don't bother her...she's digging a hole in her bread." There's the envious middle-aged guy sitting at a table a few yards from Connie and Harper who quickly gives a thumbs-up sign to the would-be Humbert Humbert. There's the bevy of women who have "graduated" from Connie course, each spending two or three years with the seductive photographer, each nicknamed Queen Guinevere by the charming fellow.
The flaws are minor, virtually unnoticeable, none distracting from the momentum of the story. Harper, for example, considers herself unfit for anything. She is not sociable, she has no interest in any craft and no intellectual pretensions. Yet we are told that she has been admitted to Harvard Law School. But who's worried? We've been made privy to the pain that lies beneath the surface of Connie's bonhomie and the potential possessed by Harper that needs only a catalyst to secure its release. All insights are put over with a good deal of humor and love making Guinevere a winning choice for September movie mavens.
Rated R. Running Time: 108 minutes. (C) 1999 Harvey Karten
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