FLESH AND BONE
A film review by Scott Renshaw
Copyright 1993 Scott Renshaw
Starring: Dennis Quaid, Meg Ryan, James Caan, Gwyneth Paltrow. Screenplay/Director: Steve Kloves.
It's about fifteen minutes into FLESH AND BONE before you see the first speck of sunlight, or hear the first note of underscore. In fact, there's almost no movement or sound of any kind. It's clear from the outset that writer/director Steve Kloves (THE FABULOUS BAKER BOYS) is going for a dark and moody feel. However, there's moody, and then there's comatose. FLESH AND BONE is the perfect example of a solid story choking nearly to death on its own atmosphere.
FLESH AND BONE opens with a rural Texas family taking in an apparently homeless boy for the night. In fact, the boy is the son of a thief who has fequently pulled this con, letting his dad into homes after everyone is asleep. This time, the robbery is botched and three members of the family are slain, leaving only an infant girl. Thirty years later, grown-up Arlis Sweeney (Dennis Quaid) is eking out a living running a vending machine supply business, content with a simple, predictable life. While on a job, he meets Kay Davies (Meg Ryan), a runaway wife jumping drunkenly out of a cake at a bachelor party. Arlis brings Kay along on his rounds, and an attraction grows. Trouble also grows when Papa Roy (James Caan) reappears, linked up with a slick young grifter (Gwyneth Paltrow). Despite every attempt to distance himself from his past, Arlis finds himself drawn into his father's obsession with tying up loose ends.
At the heart of FLESH AND BONE is an intriguing character in an intriguing premise. Arlis Sweeney is a man desperately trying to convince himself that he's not like his father, trying to live out his days meekly as a personal penance for whatever crimes he might have been party to. He feels completely unworthy of the too-trusting Kay, giving their relationship a nice dynamic. Unfortunately, Dennis Quaid is playing Arlis. As charming as he can be, Quaid simply doesn't have the dramatic range necessary to dig into this complicated character; when he should be looking introspective and guilt-ridden, he just looks stiff. I was left imagining a Jeff Bridges in the role, and what might have been given a more versatile actor.
Other aspects of the performances also left me unsatisfied. Meg Ryan has the light touch required for the film's few moments of humor, but she doesn't quite strike the balance of strength and accumulated pain required for this role. James Caan has a surprisingly small part, given his prominence in the advertising campaign, and never quite hits his stride. His performance is too mannered, full of odd jaw movements and rolled eyes. It's a major drawback, because Caan's Roy is supposed to be FLESH AND BONE's living manifestation of evil, and he's nowhere near threatening enough. Surprisingly, the best performance is turned in by Gwyneth Paltrow as the savvy Gennie, but it's hard to figure what purpose her character serves, other than perhaps to remind Arlis of what he could be.
For all the problems with the acting, it's another issue entirely that proves to be FLESH AND BONE's ultimate undoing: it's positively snore-inducing. At two hours and ten minutes, it's at *least* twenty minutes too long. The second act is interminable, chock full of scenes best left on the cutting room floor, like Kay's confrontation with her husband (apparently a refugee from THELMA AND LOUISE). There were establishing shots which lasted twice as long as necessary, and meaningful pauses which weren't very meaningful. To make matters worse, there were two minute stretches of dialogue between Caan and Quaid which were practically indecipherable (I'm not sure whether to blame the sound mixing or the theater for that one). In live theater, there is an expression: "Tighten it up." What FLESH AND BONE needed was a good tightening up.
The tone that FLESH AND BONE is going for is fully achieved. The West Texas locations are expertly captured by cinematographer Phillippe Rousselot, and the spare score by Thomas Newman has a nice edgy feel. Everything is working towards a grim tension, and it succeeds, but tension requires release and it's there that FLESH AND BONE doesn't deliver. Thanks to an ill-conceived ad campaign, one of the film's key plot points is given away in the trailers, blowing one of those release points for anyone who has seen them. There is a great deal of craft to the broad strokes of FLESH AND BONE. However, in this tale of evil, the devil is truly in the lack of details.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 guilty memories: 4.
-- Scott Renshaw Stanford University Office of the General Counsel
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