What did you think of "The Talented Mr. Ripley"?   Good 45% 540   Bad 41% 497   Somewhere in between 7% 82   Haven't seen it 7% 86 Total Votes   1205

Verdict: A handsome adaptation of a twisty thriller.

Details: Starring Matt Damon and Gwyneth Paltrow. Directed by Anthony Minghella. Rated R for violence, language and brief nudity. 2 hours, 19 minutes.

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Review: "Why is it that when men play, they always play at killing each other," sighs Marge (Gwyneth Paltrow), watching her boyfriend, Dickie, wrestle with his new best pal, Tom.

What looks like a game becomes something much deadlier in "The Talented Mr. Ripley," writer-director Anthony Minghella's handsome follow-up to his Oscar-sweeping "The English Patient." Patricia Highsmith's novel of the same name was the first in a series of books featuring Tom Ripley, a smart, charming, sexually ambiguous con man determined to live the high life, even if he has to kill to do it.

In "Ripley," Tom (Matt Damon) gets his chance when New York tycoon Herbert Greenleaf (James Rebhorn) mistakes him for an old Princeton classmate of his son Dickie (Jude Law) and sends him on a paid trip to Italy to bring home the prodigal young man. Once there, glimpsing young Dickie (and his fine clothes and his yacht), it's obvious that neither man will be swapping la dolce vita for a ticket back to the States. Instead, Tom insinuates himself into the wine-buzzed, suntanned ease of Dickie and Marge's days, eager to make their monied lifestyle — and even Dickie's identity — his own.

The couple finds him amusing to have around, like an exotic pet. Oozing his sense of entitlement, Dickie is the kind to exclaim in disbelief, "Tom can't ski! " He's a reflexive snob, like everyone else in his social stratum. That includes pal Freddie (Philip Seymour Hoffman), who derides Tom's corduroy jacket, and the lockjawed heiress, Meredith (Cate Blanchett), whom Tom meets en route to Italy. "I'm only comfortable around other people who have it and despise it," she moans about money.

When he's dealing with class tensions, Minghella's writing is sharp and perceptive. But when he tries to explain Ripley's psyche, he oversimplifies. You might not mind, if you've never seen the elegantly sinister 1960 French film "Purple Noon," a version of the same book that suggested more by stating less. Minghella's film is more faithful to the novel's plot, but not to its psychology. He reveals Tom's determination to steal Dickie's sun-drenched lifestyle too early in the movie, before the men have even met.

While Highsmith's novel itched with an unspoken homoerotic attraction between Ripley and Dickie, Minghella puts that front and center, showing that Tom is as much after Dickie's body as his identity. (Tom even tries to slip into the bathtub with his new friend.) In the book, Ripley's unformed sexuality is something he doesn't act on. Foremost, he's a sociopath who adapts himself to those he's with, so long as it gets him what he wants. In his film, Minghella suggests that Ripley acts partly out of repressed longing; he becomes a gay killer. That might disturb anybody who thinks that movies such as "Basic Instinct" and "Cruising" have done enough damage in linking gay sexuality and homicidal instincts.

There's a bigger problem. Damon and Law should have swapped roles. Law has a sexy, menacing energy that better suits Ripley's charming amorality. Damon, trying to stretch his good-guy image, doesn't generate the right amount of danger. When Dickie tells Tom, "You're so white," he's talking about his pallor, but the words could apply to Damon's performance: He lacks shading. Even when his Ripley is threatening someone with a straight razor (cutting himself in the process, like Glenn Close in "Fatal Attraction"), you can feel him working too hard to convince us.

Still, "Ripley" is an elegant pageant peppered with sharp performances. Law makes the strongest impression, followed by Blanchett's amusing, world-weary turn as a deb who falls for Tom-as-Dickie. Hoffman brings his reliable Ugly American energy to his handful of scenes as a boorish pal. Paltrow is adequate, but doesn't come up with any new tricks to make Marge distinct. She's just The Girl.

As in "The English Patient," Minghella heightens his tale with visual opulence (the movie was shot in Naples, Rome, Venice and other Italian cities). He smartly uses the 1950s time frame as an excuse to literally jazz up the soundtrack. In a way, his attractive filmmaking is more seductive than the script's mind games. The movie lets us take as much vicarious pleasure as Ripley does in the Mediterranean sun and Venetian interiors. It's an Italian feast, spiked with just enough arsenic to make the flavors interesting and dangerous.

— Steve Murray, Cox News Service

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