LANTANA
Reviewed by Harvey Karten Lions Gate Films Director: Ray Lawrence Writer: Andrew Bovell, from play "Speaking in Tongues" Cast: Anthony LaPaglia, Geoffrey Rush, Barbara Hershey, Kerry Armstrong, Rachael Blake, Vince Colosimo, Daniella Farinacci, Peter Phelps, Leah Pucell, Glenn Robbins, Russell Dykstra, Nicholas Cooper, Marc Dwyer Screened at: Disney Screening Rm NYC 9/24/01
With a crime's serving as a vehicle to explore its characters deeply, Ray Lawrence's "Lantana," which is adapted by playwright Andrew Bovell from his own theater piece "Speaking in Tongues," shares a common theme with the Coen Brothers' "The Man Who Wasn't There"--released shortly before the Lawrence picture. "The Man Who Wasn't There" featured Billy Bob Thornton as a barber who goes through the story numb, believing himself metaphorically to be invisible not only to others but even to himself--perhaps the essence of the modern, alienated man. "Lantana," which gets its name from an exotic flower which is smooth and lovely on the outside but which hides a thick, thorny growth (therefore the opposite of a sabra, or prickly pear), focuses on people who are undergoing mid-life crises, albeit at various ages, folks who think they are becoming invisible--taking leave of the lives they dreamed of having when they were kids. Though the story takes place in a suburb of Sydney, Australia, many of the people react in similar ways to Americans who undergo that psychological phenomenon. Some carry on affairs, others, lonely and perhaps not even interested in testing the sexual waters, become masochistic, make trouble, or grow suicidal.
Structured by Ray Lawrence like a Robert Altman film, featuring stories of families of strangers who become connected to one another through circumstance, "Lantana" avoid the pitfalls of soap opera by the authenticity of the acting and the maturity of the narrative. At no point does Lawrence allow the audience to take their eyes away from the screen: these Australians play characters who probably inhabit all our fears and desires as we grow older and surrender our illusions.
The principal target of Lawrence's probing lens, Leon Zat (Anthony LaPaglia), is a troubled police officer who, were he to patrol the streets of New York, might turn into what we here call a rogue cop. Partnered to a woman who seeks a mate and who looks to him for counsel, Claudia Weis (Leah Purcell), Leon is married to Sonja (Kerry Armstrong) long enough to feel the need to go astray. Carrying on what estranged Jane O'May (Rachael Blake) considers an affair but which is really just "a one-night stand done twice" (as Leon cruelly explains to her), he undergoes some enlightenment while pursuing the suspicious death of psychiatrist Dr. Valerie Somers (Barbara Hershey), whose daughter Eleanor had been murdered two years earlier, causing a rift in Valerie's marriage to John Knox (Geoffrey Rush). Leon's investigation leads him to suspect both Valerie's husband, John, and a father of three, Nik D'Amato (Vince Colosimo)--married to Paula (Daniella Farinacci)--who had given Valerie a nocturnal lift when the latter's car broke down.
One of the more interesting aspects of this complex, yet easy-to- follow plot, is that Nik and Paula, the most financially challenged and perhaps least educated couple in the story, are the happiest people around. They are undergoing no crises, do not consider themselves invisible, are not emotionally numb, and do not have to profess their love for each other: the audience goes away believing that they are the only twosome in the drama who retain their mutual chemistry. Anthony LaPaglia, interestingly cast as an Australian though known to New York theatergoers for his role in Arthur Miller's very American "A View from the Bridge" (which I saw some years back at the Circle in the Square) and to moviegoers for Spike Lee's "Summer of Sam" among other productions, conveys his tension throughout. You don't want to be arrested by this guy. Seething with frustration because of his inability to get turned on by his wife, he beats the stuffing out of a drug pusher, viciously grounds his own teenage son for doing weed, and shouts down a fellow he literally runs into on the street as he jogs in an attempt to convince himself that he's still youthful. Barbara Hershey is also terrific as a shrink who is oh-so-confident while gently questioning a client but who demonstrates Freud's theory of counter-transference in his dislike for a gay patient, Patrick (Peter Phelps), whose dilly-dallying with a married man forces her to confront her own paranoia about her marriage to John.
"Lantana" is for a mature audience, people who go to the theater to learn more about themselves rather than to escape from their daily problems. Ray Lawrence wonderfully mines territory similar to what he dug into with the underappreciated "Bliss"-- capturing the same, almost clinical dimensions of a therapist (played by Terence Stamp) who in treating a man with emotional problems unlocks the door to his wife's forgotten past.
Rated R. Running time: 121 minutes. (C) 2001 by Harvey Karten, film_critic@compuserve.com
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