Monday, November 12, 2007
Two Women and Their Destiny
I'm in Brazil, and saw a great film on the way down, on my mini-DVD-player: John Sayles' terrific 1992 film 'Passion Fish,' about an embittered paralyzed soap opera star (Mary McDonnell, left and below) self-exiled to Louisiana and her nurse/caretaker (Alfre Woodard, left). This became 'Two Women and Their Destiny' for Latin distribution... What a great film! I admire Sayles, but somehow missed this one in 1992. But I fell in love with Mary McDonnell as featured in 'Battlestar Gallactica' as a the woman who becomes President after a nuclear holocaust. When I realized she'd been Oscar-nominated for her 'Passion Fish' work, I put it in my 'Netflix' cue... Happy to report it's as gripping, authentic, and cinematographic as anything in the Sayles oeuvre....
Let's run this through the 5 Parameters of Criticism, and you'll find out why it was called Passion Fish to begin with..
1. Four Words That Encapsule: "Live With Paralysis? How?"2. Haiku (5/7/5)
"Life as you knew it
Severed at the spine - not fair
Close down? Accept loss?"
3. Oblique Comments: Why the title change in Spanish? Latin American film distributors have long since reached the conclusion that poetic American titles don't translate well or attract movie audiences, and that a film's working title had better tell you exactly what the film is about. Hence, 'The Godfather' in Brazil is known as 'The Powerful Head of the Mafia' and 'The Sound of Music' is known nearly everywhere as 'The Rebel Novice.'
4. Insight: We are taught to look on the bright side, but paralysis victims know the cruel truth of their condition. Limits, barriers, diminished possibilities, great loss, so much you're shut out of. Despite sincere PC-laden efforts, there is much in our society that rejects people that aren't fully functional. "Passion Fish" takes an unflinching view and an intelligent, but non-heroic actress who struggles between apathy and anger, who shuts down. It shows that she still longs for love, affection - there's a frustrated, lonely married man who feels drawn to her at the end - but all we get is a suggestion that they may hang out more. This guy gives boat tours of the swampy, alligator- and snake-infested bayou. At one point, they catch raw, live 'passion fish, ' reputed to grant innermost wishes.
5. Link: New York Times review
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