Very much looking forward to watching this. Am a big fan of both the book and the film (speaking as an Italian, it’s my favourite film set in Italy) and Scott is my favourite Hamlet. I was a tad disappointed with Highsmith’s other Ripley novels and their subsequent films in comparison.
The film is an odd beast although very good. Matt Damon’s Ripley is different to my reading of him in the book. There is a DVD extra in which Damon says that the lesson of the film is to ‘be yourself’ or some such triteness, whereas my interpretation of the book is that Ripley wished other people would let him be who he wants to be. It’s not that he wants to be a cold-blooded psychopathic killer, because the inconvenience that creates is a terrible bore, but other people just get in his way.
Yes, I agree with that. I think also that the film gives the impression that Ripley is in love with Dickie, whereas (IIRC) the book gave more the impression that Ripley is in love with Dickie’s lifestyle. The reason I love the film so much is that I think it gets so many details about Italy, and especially “the ex-pat in Italy”, exactly right. For example there’s one line in the film where Freddie Miles (a brilliant performance by Philip Seymour Hoffman) is looking for Dickie and Ripley claims he’s gone to dinner. Miles says something like “Dinner? At 5.30? I don’t think so! If you’d said he was still at lunch I might believe you.” A line definitely written by someone who knows Italy. And the whole jazz club scene in Naples where they perform Tu Vuo Fà L’Americano is sooooo Italian.
I loved Purple Noon with Alain Delon, but it’s an odd film because as deeply unpleasant as his character is portrayed you’re always hoping he doesn’t get caught while you’re watching it (that’s how I found it anyway).
Very much looking forward to watching Ripley
There was a touch of Ripley-styler darkness about PH herself if the biog that came out a few years back is to be believed. No wonder she and Hitch seemed so simpatico.
Would have loved to see his take on TTMR. I suspect pre- and early-Hollywood Hitch would have gone with the stark current take whereas mid-/late-period Hitch would have gone the sun-drenched Minghella route
Can’t remember where I read it but Highsmith was described as a rather unpleasant person. A lesbian who disliked the company of women and much preferred the company of men. An oddball.
I started reading “The Tremor Of Forgery” a while back*, but found it an unpleasant read for some indefinable reason and set it aside. I may return to it eventually.
*One of a little stack of paperbacks retrieved from my late brother’s shelves.
Highsmith’s sex life was complicated in the extreme – she preferred the company of men but hated having sex with them. She had an affair with Arthur Koestler to try and prove to the world that she wasn’t a lesbian, and also had an affair with the wife of her English publisher. Full juicy details on her Wiki page.
I’m really enjoying it. I have a hard time telling one grunting Japanese warlord from another sometimes, but it’s continuously absorbing, brilliantly shot – and informative too. Never having read or seen the original Shogun, I had no idea about the Portuguese and their doings.
I revived my Disney+ sub to watch Poor Things, worth it just for that.
Just read that Sting and Trudy Styler’s “non binary offspring” plays Freddie Miles. Is they good? I thought Bono’s daughter was very good in that Behind Her Eyes series.
Am watching it too now. Am up to episode 4 and enjoying it. It’s beautifully shot (though I recently watched Joel Cohen’s -very brilliant, imho- The Tragedy of Macbeth and that already had me thinking how beautiful black and white cinematography can be). I like that it’s a very, very different take on the novel to Minghella’s film. But so far, I prefer the film. Johnny Flynn is too old and not handsome enough to be Dickie Greenleaf and Andrew Scott’s Ripley is much colder and far more psycho than Matt Damon’s, so doesn’t elicit the same weird mixture of horror and sympathy.
Also… Sting’s non-binary offspring, Eliot Sumner, compared to Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Freddie Miles? No comparison! Seymour Hoffman is so much better. For one thing Sumner looks more like a woman than a man. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I’d always imagined Freddie Miles as a man, as I think Patricia Highsmith probably did. I think it’s kinda integral to the role. I see Wikipedia refers to Sumner as “it”, which strikes me as a bit rude, but perhaps it’s not.
I’ve watched three episodes and it’s just not working for me. I don’t think I’ve seen Andrew Scott in anything else, but he’s failing to convey any of the charm that a character like Ripley must have. I don’t think he’s good-looking and/or attractive and he seems far too old. The pace is also snail-like and some of the sequences seem ill-considered. For example, the business of him struggling up endless Italian steps introduces an element of comedy, but why? This sequence only really serves to disturb the carefully established mood. I watched the Anthony Minghella version recently, so it’s too soon to re-watch it again, but for me the older version absolutely trounces this new telling in every respect.
I’m enjoying it, but I agree with you. Especially with your opinion that Scott’s portrayal lacks Ripley’s requisite charm. For me too, “the older version absolutely trounces this new telling in every respect”. I do like how the series is shot in black and white, but the casting (of every single character) as well as the writing is much, much better in the film version.
I see the writer-director of the series has written some excellent films (including Schindler’s List!) but I think Minghella had a much better understanding of the characters and of Italy itself.
I’ve decided to bail. The series, that is. The first episode says everything I need to hear, and works nicely as a story in itself. Taken that way, I’ve seen movies with less satisfactory endings.
Seems The Guardian agrees with Gary (fact check needed)
” I felt nervous about the new eight-part adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 psychological thriller, The Talented Mr Ripley. Would Netflix stuff it up? We’re all hardened to botched streamer adaptations, but this is Tom Ripley, the reptilian anti-hero grifter of Highsmith’s five (“Ripliad”) novels. Would they soften Tom up, make him (I can hardly bear to type these words) “more likable”? Of previous adaptations, I loved Anthony Minghella’s glossy, shattering 1999 film starring Matt Damon (even if liberties were taken with the text). Anyway, I needn’t have fretted. Ripley is intelligent, mercurial, beautiful and devastating. It’s what it needed to be: a work of art about a nasty piece of work.
Steven Zaillian (Oscar-winning writer of the screenplay for Schindler’s List; creator of The Night of…) is at the helm, and Andrew Scott (All of Us Strangers; Sherlock) stars as Ripley. Many will know the bare bones of the plot (spoilers ahead): a New York shipping magnate unwittingly sends con artist Ripley to 1960s Italy to entice home his faux-bohemian son, Dickie (Johnny Flynn). Ripley ingratiates himself with Dickie and his partner, Marge (Dakota Fanning), and murder ensues, followed by cover-ups, identity theft and more killing across Italy.
It’s not so much what Ripley does, it’s what he is. It’s up to Scott to illuminate the darkness, rage and hypervigilance behind Ripley’s surface charm, and does he ever deliver. Here’s a cold, sly, unknowable Ripley, with a gift for hollow people-pleasing. As the net closes in, the story pulses with themes: class; avarice; obsession; queerness – though Scott’s Tom is never in love with Dickie (just with what he’s got).
Ripley is filmed in chilly, elegant black and white, and, at first, I wondered if it was an absurd waste of the sumptuous Italian scenery. However, as well as nodding to classic cinema (Fellini/Hitchcock), Zaillian teases different moods out of the monochrome (suspense; resignation). Sometimes the likes of urbane Dickie and Marge, and Dickie’s suspicious friend Freddie (Eliot Sumner) feel flat (characters with the volume bafflingly turned down). However, as well as being closer in tone to the novel, the drama’s overall subtlety helps build tension: an understated but chilling early scene involves Tom softly mimicking Dickie in front of a mirror.
It isn’t as lean as it could be (there are prolonged lulls in Rome and Venice; an overblown diversion about Caravaggio), but what a sublime character study for Scott, what luscious photography, what prestige cat-and-mouse storytelling. It’s a triumph.”
I disagree with every single word of that (fact check needed).
My biggest perplexity is, why cast a (…am I allowed to say this?…) female as Freddie Miles? Because Sting’s daughter? An especially odd choice to follow in the footsteps of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s absolutely perfect performance.
The thing about Matt Damon’s Ripley is that you understood him, even felt sympathy for him, while at the same time seeing him as an opportunistic murderer. It’s impossible to feel any sympathy for Scott’s Ripley, he’s just a cold-blooded psycho.
But I’ll tell you what really got on my nerves: the police detective’s English. His comprehension of English was 100% perfect, he understood every word Ripley said; his vocabulary was extremely impressive for an Italian (“bludgeoned”, “unsavoury” – very few Italians would know these words); yet his grammar was crap (“At which time does Freddie Miles leave last night?”).
The series wasn’t bad. I liked it. But the film was so much better. Minghella got every single detail just right, imho. Perhaps because of his Italian background.
I did something I almost never do – I binged the whole lot over two days. I liked it a lot, but that’s not surprising as I am usually predisposed to liking something if I sit down to watch it. I loved the cast and some great pieces – the almost dialogue-free twenty minutes or so in ep.5 (I think) I quite liked Eliot Sumner as Freddy – I thought we might have seen a few more scenes with Freddy but what we got was good. I enjoyed the police detective and his Clouseau-like mangling of the English language.
The detective’s mangling of English might have been entertaining, but it wasn’t believable. No one would have such a high level of comprehension and vocabulary but such a low level of grammar and pronunciation. It showed sloppy writing on Zaillian’s part (or a lack of concern for realism). Adding to the lack of realism was the fact that Freddie Miles was obviously female but no one seemed to notice. (Have you seen the film version? Freddie Miles is my favourite of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s performances. Outstanding.)
I didn’t much care for Dakota Fanning’s performance as Marge either. Totally flat and unemotional. And I didn’t like the way she took against Ripley from the start but slightly warmed to him at the end. The opposite of Gwyneth Paltrow’s Marge, who initially bonded with Ripley over their shared loved of Dickie but came to hate him as her suspicions grew. I can’t remember now which portrayal of Marge is more similar to the book, but one thing’s for sure: both Scott (47) and Flynn (41) were way older than their literary counterparts, who were in their mid-20s, IIRC.
And isn’t your dislike of the detective, rather like those people who shout “Wrong bus stop!” at period films, based on local knowledge of the language? I have heard you are 100% fluid in Italian
I’m fluid in everything, but I would’ve imagined that anyone who has regular contact with non-English speakers would recognise that glaring inconsistency.
The detective in the film was played by the very excellent Sergio Rubini (from Puglia). He’s famous in Italy as both an actor and director. Although, talking of entertainment, one of my favourite and funniest moments in the film version is when another detective is interrogating Ripley with the help of Peter Smith-Kingsley (Jack Davenport) as translator. The detective asks a question, Ripley replies “no” and the detective looks enquiringly at Smith-Kingsley who “translates” for him by repeating “no” with a slightly more Italian pronunciation.
Hasn’t the slightly eccentric (or in some cases slow-witted) detective always been something of a trope in detective literature and films.
Inspector LeStrade in Conan-Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes and Claude Eustace Teal in Lesley Charteris’s The Saint are two obvious examples. His apparent obtuseness concealing a razor-sharp mind, Peter Falk’s Columbo was a variation on the same theme
Up to episode 6 and gripped. I think Scott is perfect as the ageing conman grasping one last Grecian 2000 helmed grift, and his flat and flip badness is perfect, not least the ineptness of the barely competent small water shark. Flynn captures the louche pretend boho that the wealthy all have tucked away, at least one per family. (Sumner may, in real life, confirm that reality and is plain annoying. I assumed they had changed the part to a caricature “Cabaret” Isherwood lesbian, until the idea she was a he became bludgeoning.) The Italians seem there more for light relief, it’s true, but I found them essentially lightly relieving, especially, yes, the Clouseau-sequence cop. Fanning just seemed appropriately 2D, a trust fund magnet, gradually approaching the shock of insight, something usually beyond her needs or grasp.
The cat was faaaaaaaaabulous!!!!!
It’s different, which is a cop- out, but I saw it a long time ago and suspect it was a Sunday night rental after a long liquid day. My mind says it was too swish and suave, hence perhaps the rationale for this to have to be snails pace monochrome. I don’t even remember Hoffman, which is unforgivable and, if nothing else, has me looking forward to next finding and watching the film version.
Finished off the last 2 episodes now. All the characters seemed to have shuffled attributes and identities a little, possibly the only way the inept and clumsy Ripley could have become suddenly successfully convincing, in his palazzo, and fobbed off the Italian cop, Dickies dad and the now down to 1D Marge. Uncertain, until the end, of the purpose of the gloriously louche Malkovich cameo, the character then seeming just a convenient ruse, by Highsmith, to allow 4 further volumes. I sort of wonder whether he was written more overtly as a spiv in the book? And I can’t remember the film version’s coverage of this, assuming it did.
Neither the film nor the novel had the Malkovich character. He crops up in a later Ripley book. I think maybe Malkovich was only there cos he had already played Ripley himself (in Ripley’s Game) so it would make nicely meta reference. I thought he was awful in this.
The film did have an extra character, called Meredith, who was not in the book (nor in this series). I thought she was an excellent addition to the story and played brilliantly by Cate Blanchett.
Ps. As a reminder, here’s Philip Seymour Hoffman being just great as Freddie Miles:
I thoroughly enjoyed it. I loved the slow pace, the long interludes going up and down stairs, the wonderful black and white cinematography and the fabulous Italian backdrop. I liked the fact the actors were less young and beautiful than in the movie. I also had no problem with the casting of Freddie, who, after all, is an exotic flamboyant creature and unpleasantly arrogant.
I’d like that. I imagine it would be a bit like The Assembly, with me instead of Michael Sheen and Tigger asking me all sorts of neurodivergent questions.
I thoroughly enjoyed it. I loved the slow pace, the long interludes going up and down stairs, the wonderful black and white cinematography and the fabulous Italian backdrop. I liked the fact the actors were less young and beautiful than in the movie. I also had no problem with the casting of Freddie, who, after all, is an exotic flamboyant creature and unpleasantly arrogant.
I could watch it all again.
😉
However, I think Euron Griffiths book A Casual Life is more worthy of your time.
Not sure but so far underwhelmed: all a bit poncey arty meaningful and
not one piece of gratuitous violence or one sight of naked breasts. I have no idea why I keep paying my TV Licence fee.
Watched Ep1 to 3. Very much enjoying it. Don’t know anything of the books, so watching with no pre-perception.
Pace and photography reminds me greatly of the George Clooney film, ‘The American’.
I say, fellows! That opulent villa, however, is not actually in Atrani, but on the nearby island of Capri. Villa Torricella was built in 1902 in eclectic style – turrets, Moorish colonnades, pointed arches and twisted columns – for an earlier pair of American socialites, Kate Perry and Saidee Wolcott, who hid their gay relationship by portraying themselves as sisters.
(Tiny Quiz: what popular broadsheet newspaper was this lifted from? The article also mentions how the town is being swamped by Ripley fans – imagine the atmosphere!)
I posted on another thread about this, not knowing this thread was here!
I thought Andrew Scott was terrific in this, and I think it worked with him being older than Matt Damon’s portrayal: it seemed like a last chance for the character to move on in the world. I can’t say I like Matt Damon much as an actor, and I thought his portrayal of Ripley was too sympathetic.
A tough role for Johnny Flynn as Dickie, though. I like Flynn, but he’s just miscast here – his portrayal comes across as too introverted and sensitive; he didn’t seem particularly spoilt or lacking in self-awareness. It was the role of a lifetime for Jude Law (an actor I don’t much care for usually), and he was brilliant in the film at capturing the spirit of the trust fund cad: totally spoilt, superficially fun, good looking and easily bored.
Flynn is portraying Richard Burton in a play at the moment; this would seem a much better fit.
Flynn was miscast??? Whilst I am wholeheartedly agree, Freddie Miles was played by a female lady woman of the opposite gender! I don’t understand how it doesn’t bother fans of the TV series (which, I think we all agree, is not as good as the book or the film) aren’t bothered by the fact that Freddie Miles is obviously not what Freddie Miles is supposed to be gender-wise and yet no one notices! Is no one bothered by no one noticing things anymore? Have we become that blasè? Can anyone be anything and it doesn’t matter? Is this the future? I’ve written to the Daily Mail.
Never mind who played Fredina, the bus stop where Ripley waited was clearly marked “Stagecoach” ! I’ve written to my MP (somebody called Le Pen, I await his/her reply).
I actually thought it was deliberate casting – an androgynous appearance adding to the questions of identity. Or am I overthinking it and missing the irony of an offspring of a multi-millionaire playing a rich, spoilt type?
S’bizarre Atrani is being swamped by Ripley fans as neither the book (which is much better than the TV series, good as that may be) nor the film (which is also much better than the TV series, good as that may be) are set in Atrani. They’re both set in the fictional town of Mongibello, though I suppose that’s a bit harder to visit on account of it not existing and everything.
That said, the more deluded of that particular group are credulous enough to turn on JK Rowling for questioning whether a male rapist who claims he is a woman should be sent to a women’s prison
Now I’m not saying Freddie Miles is a rapist (though, frankly, I wouldn’t put it past him), but if he were there’s plenty here would have no problem with him being sent to a woman’s prison
Saw the “must watch” Episode 3 last night. Beautifully shot, stunning acting – but it’s all a bit of a posh Miss Marple isn’t it? Entertaining stuff but nowhere near the hyped-up classic I was led to believe ….
We are totes agree! Is that a first? It is indeed entertaining stuff but nowhere near the hyped-up classic you were led to believe. Now just add “and not as good as the film” and you can be me.
Me and Mrs – ” I know we’ve seen the film and we know it was good” but neither can remember anything about it. We have no idea what’s happening next apart from Ripley pretends he’s the dead bloke and it all ends badly. Perhaps. It’s like an Old Folks Home here….
You should have bailed after the first episode, like moi. Everything you need – bar the ballcrushing tedium – is in that first show. The black and white photography. The stunning setting. The … did I mention the stunning cinematography? The black and white setting?
No, no, no! Dickie had to be better looking and more all-round attractive than Tom or the story wouldn’t work. Imagine, if you will, me obsessively drooling over H.P. Saucecraft. Can’t, can you? Because me and because H.P. Saucecraft. But the other way round and the whole thing becomes credible almost to the point of believability.
Nope. There are plenty of male leads who could have played Dickie without being eclipsed by Jude Law in the looks department. “Playing against type”? Nah, as well as nope. Matt Damon was miscast – Ripley has to have something seductive and charming about him, not be a geek, not be an ordinary blerk. He has to have a suggestion of evil about him, something dangerous, yet compelling. Matt Freaking Damon? Are you kidding me? Adam Sandler would have been better casting. But I’m thinking Jude Law as Ripley, Brad Pitt as Dickie.
Jaygee says
Bump (off)
Beany says
They have been filming for the next series in Bolton. The police station scenes are filmed in Le Mans Crescent, behind the town hall.
Jaygee says
Bolton?
Are you sure you’re not getting it mixed up with Death in Paradise?
Beany says
Ewan McGregor was in town recently filming A Gentleman In Moscow. We are becoming the Hollywood of the north*
(c) Bolton Tourist Authority.
Black Type says
Ahem…I think you’ll find that accolade is over in East Yorkshire.
https://news.hull.gov.uk/22/03/2024/lights-camera-action-new-trail-lets-visitors-walk-in-hullywoods-footsteps/
Moose the Mooche says
It’s Errbi Won Kenerrbi!
Foxnose says
On episode three and STILL no aliens!
Jaygee says
Andrew Scott has caused many a female heart to burst these last few years so there’s still time for some major chest-level pyrotechnics
Lodestone of Wrongness says
That’s the openly gay Andrew Scott?
Jaygee says
Yes. The ladies hearts will burst with the pressure of all that unrequited lust
Lodestone of Wrongness says
True dat
Moose the Mooche says
His gayness makes him automatically unattractive? Interesting theory
Jaygee says
Not sure how you worked that out…
Gary says
I bet it involved masturbation.
Moose the Mooche says
…I tend to forget that on the AW it’s not just the music that’s from 1971…
Lodestone of Wrongness says
I know several women who have said of Andrew Scott “Pity he’s gay”: that’s all I was getting at
Jaygee says
Careful, Lodey, or you’ll get hit in the eye by one M’s energetically virtue-signaling arms
Moose the Mooche says
I’m making a signal to you now. Can you see it?
Gary says
Very much looking forward to watching this. Am a big fan of both the book and the film (speaking as an Italian, it’s my favourite film set in Italy) and Scott is my favourite Hamlet. I was a tad disappointed with Highsmith’s other Ripley novels and their subsequent films in comparison.
Jaygee says
Strangers in a Train was terrific
Gatz says
The film is an odd beast although very good. Matt Damon’s Ripley is different to my reading of him in the book. There is a DVD extra in which Damon says that the lesson of the film is to ‘be yourself’ or some such triteness, whereas my interpretation of the book is that Ripley wished other people would let him be who he wants to be. It’s not that he wants to be a cold-blooded psychopathic killer, because the inconvenience that creates is a terrible bore, but other people just get in his way.
Gary says
Yes, I agree with that. I think also that the film gives the impression that Ripley is in love with Dickie, whereas (IIRC) the book gave more the impression that Ripley is in love with Dickie’s lifestyle. The reason I love the film so much is that I think it gets so many details about Italy, and especially “the ex-pat in Italy”, exactly right. For example there’s one line in the film where Freddie Miles (a brilliant performance by Philip Seymour Hoffman) is looking for Dickie and Ripley claims he’s gone to dinner. Miles says something like “Dinner? At 5.30? I don’t think so! If you’d said he was still at lunch I might believe you.” A line definitely written by someone who knows Italy. And the whole jazz club scene in Naples where they perform Tu Vuo Fà L’Americano is sooooo Italian.
Gatz says
Your point about Ripley being in love with Dickie or his lifestyle is echoed in Lucy Mangan’s enthusiastic review https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2024/apr/04/ripley-review-andrew-scott-is-absolutely-spellbinding
myoldman says
I loved Purple Noon with Alain Delon, but it’s an odd film because as deeply unpleasant as his character is portrayed you’re always hoping he doesn’t get caught while you’re watching it (that’s how I found it anyway).
Very much looking forward to watching Ripley
Jaygee says
There was a touch of Ripley-styler darkness about PH herself if the biog that came out a few years back is to be believed. No wonder she and Hitch seemed so simpatico.
Would have loved to see his take on TTMR. I suspect pre- and early-Hollywood Hitch would have gone with the stark current take whereas mid-/late-period Hitch would have gone the sun-drenched Minghella route
Mike_H says
Can’t remember where I read it but Highsmith was described as a rather unpleasant person. A lesbian who disliked the company of women and much preferred the company of men. An oddball.
I started reading “The Tremor Of Forgery” a while back*, but found it an unpleasant read for some indefinable reason and set it aside. I may return to it eventually.
*One of a little stack of paperbacks retrieved from my late brother’s shelves.
hubert rawlinson says
I think it was touched on in the Richard E Grant programme ‘Write Around the World with Richard E Grant’ though of course I could be wrong.
mikethep says
Highsmith’s sex life was complicated in the extreme – she preferred the company of men but hated having sex with them. She had an affair with Arthur Koestler to try and prove to the world that she wasn’t a lesbian, and also had an affair with the wife of her English publisher. Full juicy details on her Wiki page.
Moose the Mooche says
Are you sure she didn’t have an affair with Koestler to prove to the world that she had very bad taste?
mikethep says
Or that she fancied tiny chaps.
Kaisfatdad says
I just took a quick look at the trailer. The photography is stupendous.
Jaygee says
Absolutely. Almost every shot would look brilliant blown up big, framed and given pride of place on your wall
mikethep says
On my list. I need to finish Shogun and 3 Body Problem first…
Leedsboy says
Is Shogun good? Have droped my Disney+ sub with thte intent to have a month every quarter to blitz through the good stuff. Should it be on my list?
I recall loving the book as a late teen.
mikethep says
I’m really enjoying it. I have a hard time telling one grunting Japanese warlord from another sometimes, but it’s continuously absorbing, brilliantly shot – and informative too. Never having read or seen the original Shogun, I had no idea about the Portuguese and their doings.
I revived my Disney+ sub to watch Poor Things, worth it just for that.
Gary says
Just read that Sting and Trudy Styler’s “non binary offspring” plays Freddie Miles. Is they good? I thought Bono’s daughter was very good in that Behind Her Eyes series.
fortuneight says
She was very good in Bad Sisters too.
Black Type says
And in Twin Peaks, naturellement.
H.P. Saucecraft says
Just watched E01. Very, very good, even if we got our noses rubbed in arthouse textures a little too often.
mikethep says
There are worse things to have your nose rubbed in when Ripley’s around.
Jaygee says
When Ripley is around, being “rubbed in” is the least of your worries
Gary says
Am watching it too now. Am up to episode 4 and enjoying it. It’s beautifully shot (though I recently watched Joel Cohen’s -very brilliant, imho- The Tragedy of Macbeth and that already had me thinking how beautiful black and white cinematography can be). I like that it’s a very, very different take on the novel to Minghella’s film. But so far, I prefer the film. Johnny Flynn is too old and not handsome enough to be Dickie Greenleaf and Andrew Scott’s Ripley is much colder and far more psycho than Matt Damon’s, so doesn’t elicit the same weird mixture of horror and sympathy.
Gary says
Also… Sting’s non-binary offspring, Eliot Sumner, compared to Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Freddie Miles? No comparison! Seymour Hoffman is so much better. For one thing Sumner looks more like a woman than a man. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I’d always imagined Freddie Miles as a man, as I think Patricia Highsmith probably did. I think it’s kinda integral to the role. I see Wikipedia refers to Sumner as “it”, which strikes me as a bit rude, but perhaps it’s not.
Rufus T Firefly says
I’ve watched three episodes and it’s just not working for me. I don’t think I’ve seen Andrew Scott in anything else, but he’s failing to convey any of the charm that a character like Ripley must have. I don’t think he’s good-looking and/or attractive and he seems far too old. The pace is also snail-like and some of the sequences seem ill-considered. For example, the business of him struggling up endless Italian steps introduces an element of comedy, but why? This sequence only really serves to disturb the carefully established mood. I watched the Anthony Minghella version recently, so it’s too soon to re-watch it again, but for me the older version absolutely trounces this new telling in every respect.
Gary says
I’m enjoying it, but I agree with you. Especially with your opinion that Scott’s portrayal lacks Ripley’s requisite charm. For me too, “the older version absolutely trounces this new telling in every respect”. I do like how the series is shot in black and white, but the casting (of every single character) as well as the writing is much, much better in the film version.
I see the writer-director of the series has written some excellent films (including Schindler’s List!) but I think Minghella had a much better understanding of the characters and of Italy itself.
dai says
Yes, only seen one episode, but tend to agree. Will try one or two more though given the rave reviews expressed above.
Freddy Steady says
Spoiler alert!
The boat bit is a bit ITV.
H.P. Saucecraft says
I’ve decided to bail. The series, that is. The first episode says everything I need to hear, and works nicely as a story in itself. Taken that way, I’ve seen movies with less satisfactory endings.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Seems The Guardian agrees with Gary (fact check needed)
” I felt nervous about the new eight-part adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 psychological thriller, The Talented Mr Ripley. Would Netflix stuff it up? We’re all hardened to botched streamer adaptations, but this is Tom Ripley, the reptilian anti-hero grifter of Highsmith’s five (“Ripliad”) novels. Would they soften Tom up, make him (I can hardly bear to type these words) “more likable”? Of previous adaptations, I loved Anthony Minghella’s glossy, shattering 1999 film starring Matt Damon (even if liberties were taken with the text). Anyway, I needn’t have fretted. Ripley is intelligent, mercurial, beautiful and devastating. It’s what it needed to be: a work of art about a nasty piece of work.
Steven Zaillian (Oscar-winning writer of the screenplay for Schindler’s List; creator of The Night of…) is at the helm, and Andrew Scott (All of Us Strangers; Sherlock) stars as Ripley. Many will know the bare bones of the plot (spoilers ahead): a New York shipping magnate unwittingly sends con artist Ripley to 1960s Italy to entice home his faux-bohemian son, Dickie (Johnny Flynn). Ripley ingratiates himself with Dickie and his partner, Marge (Dakota Fanning), and murder ensues, followed by cover-ups, identity theft and more killing across Italy.
It’s not so much what Ripley does, it’s what he is. It’s up to Scott to illuminate the darkness, rage and hypervigilance behind Ripley’s surface charm, and does he ever deliver. Here’s a cold, sly, unknowable Ripley, with a gift for hollow people-pleasing. As the net closes in, the story pulses with themes: class; avarice; obsession; queerness – though Scott’s Tom is never in love with Dickie (just with what he’s got).
Ripley is filmed in chilly, elegant black and white, and, at first, I wondered if it was an absurd waste of the sumptuous Italian scenery. However, as well as nodding to classic cinema (Fellini/Hitchcock), Zaillian teases different moods out of the monochrome (suspense; resignation). Sometimes the likes of urbane Dickie and Marge, and Dickie’s suspicious friend Freddie (Eliot Sumner) feel flat (characters with the volume bafflingly turned down). However, as well as being closer in tone to the novel, the drama’s overall subtlety helps build tension: an understated but chilling early scene involves Tom softly mimicking Dickie in front of a mirror.
It isn’t as lean as it could be (there are prolonged lulls in Rome and Venice; an overblown diversion about Caravaggio), but what a sublime character study for Scott, what luscious photography, what prestige cat-and-mouse storytelling. It’s a triumph.”
Gary says
I disagree with every single word of that (fact check needed).
My biggest perplexity is, why cast a (…am I allowed to say this?…) female as Freddie Miles? Because Sting’s daughter? An especially odd choice to follow in the footsteps of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s absolutely perfect performance.
The thing about Matt Damon’s Ripley is that you understood him, even felt sympathy for him, while at the same time seeing him as an opportunistic murderer. It’s impossible to feel any sympathy for Scott’s Ripley, he’s just a cold-blooded psycho.
But I’ll tell you what really got on my nerves: the police detective’s English. His comprehension of English was 100% perfect, he understood every word Ripley said; his vocabulary was extremely impressive for an Italian (“bludgeoned”, “unsavoury” – very few Italians would know these words); yet his grammar was crap (“At which time does Freddie Miles leave last night?”).
The series wasn’t bad. I liked it. But the film was so much better. Minghella got every single detail just right, imho. Perhaps because of his Italian background.
Max the Dog says
I did something I almost never do – I binged the whole lot over two days. I liked it a lot, but that’s not surprising as I am usually predisposed to liking something if I sit down to watch it. I loved the cast and some great pieces – the almost dialogue-free twenty minutes or so in ep.5 (I think) I quite liked Eliot Sumner as Freddy – I thought we might have seen a few more scenes with Freddy but what we got was good. I enjoyed the police detective and his Clouseau-like mangling of the English language.
Jaygee says
Nice pen!
Gary says
The detective’s mangling of English might have been entertaining, but it wasn’t believable. No one would have such a high level of comprehension and vocabulary but such a low level of grammar and pronunciation. It showed sloppy writing on Zaillian’s part (or a lack of concern for realism). Adding to the lack of realism was the fact that Freddie Miles was obviously female but no one seemed to notice. (Have you seen the film version? Freddie Miles is my favourite of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s performances. Outstanding.)
I didn’t much care for Dakota Fanning’s performance as Marge either. Totally flat and unemotional. And I didn’t like the way she took against Ripley from the start but slightly warmed to him at the end. The opposite of Gwyneth Paltrow’s Marge, who initially bonded with Ripley over their shared loved of Dickie but came to hate him as her suspicions grew. I can’t remember now which portrayal of Marge is more similar to the book, but one thing’s for sure: both Scott (47) and Flynn (41) were way older than their literary counterparts, who were in their mid-20s, IIRC.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
But apart from those minor quibbles you thought it was great?
Gary says
Best thing ever.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
And isn’t your dislike of the detective, rather like those people who shout “Wrong bus stop!” at period films, based on local knowledge of the language? I have heard you are 100% fluid in Italian
Gary says
I’m fluid in everything, but I would’ve imagined that anyone who has regular contact with non-English speakers would recognise that glaring inconsistency.
The detective in the film was played by the very excellent Sergio Rubini (from Puglia). He’s famous in Italy as both an actor and director. Although, talking of entertainment, one of my favourite and funniest moments in the film version is when another detective is interrogating Ripley with the help of Peter Smith-Kingsley (Jack Davenport) as translator. The detective asks a question, Ripley replies “no” and the detective looks enquiringly at Smith-Kingsley who “translates” for him by repeating “no” with a slightly more Italian pronunciation.
Jaygee says
Hasn’t the slightly eccentric (or in some cases slow-witted) detective always been something of a trope in detective literature and films.
Inspector LeStrade in Conan-Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes and Claude Eustace Teal in Lesley Charteris’s The Saint are two obvious examples. His apparent obtuseness concealing a razor-sharp mind, Peter Falk’s Columbo was a variation on the same theme
retropath2 says
Up to episode 6 and gripped. I think Scott is perfect as the ageing conman grasping one last Grecian 2000 helmed grift, and his flat and flip badness is perfect, not least the ineptness of the barely competent small water shark. Flynn captures the louche pretend boho that the wealthy all have tucked away, at least one per family. (Sumner may, in real life, confirm that reality and is plain annoying. I assumed they had changed the part to a caricature “Cabaret” Isherwood lesbian, until the idea she was a he became bludgeoning.) The Italians seem there more for light relief, it’s true, but I found them essentially lightly relieving, especially, yes, the Clouseau-sequence cop. Fanning just seemed appropriately 2D, a trust fund magnet, gradually approaching the shock of insight, something usually beyond her needs or grasp.
The cat was faaaaaaaaabulous!!!!!
Gary says
How would you say it compares to the film (if you’ve seen it)?
retropath2 says
It’s different, which is a cop- out, but I saw it a long time ago and suspect it was a Sunday night rental after a long liquid day. My mind says it was too swish and suave, hence perhaps the rationale for this to have to be snails pace monochrome. I don’t even remember Hoffman, which is unforgivable and, if nothing else, has me looking forward to next finding and watching the film version.
Gary says
I must say, I do like the fact that the series has gone for a couldn’t-be-more-different telling of the same story. That was a good decision.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
We’ve only got 17 more series to watch before we get to Ripley so stand by for my definitive and potentially explosive review around mid-July.
People who say “there’s nowt on telly” couldn’t be Wronger…
Jaygee says
There’s definitely nowt on our telly.
All the little gewgaws that used to sit happily on top of our old 26″ set fell off and smashed when we switched to flat-screen
H.P. Saucecraft says
Try Sugar. First two episodes have annoying stylistic tics but otherwise watchable.
Jaygee says
Got a dreadful review in the Graun – always a good sign. Will give it a go when all ythe eps are up in a month or so
retropath2 says
Finished off the last 2 episodes now. All the characters seemed to have shuffled attributes and identities a little, possibly the only way the inept and clumsy Ripley could have become suddenly successfully convincing, in his palazzo, and fobbed off the Italian cop, Dickies dad and the now down to 1D Marge. Uncertain, until the end, of the purpose of the gloriously louche Malkovich cameo, the character then seeming just a convenient ruse, by Highsmith, to allow 4 further volumes. I sort of wonder whether he was written more overtly as a spiv in the book? And I can’t remember the film version’s coverage of this, assuming it did.
Gary says
Neither the film nor the novel had the Malkovich character. He crops up in a later Ripley book. I think maybe Malkovich was only there cos he had already played Ripley himself (in Ripley’s Game) so it would make nicely meta reference. I thought he was awful in this.
The film did have an extra character, called Meredith, who was not in the book (nor in this series). I thought she was an excellent addition to the story and played brilliantly by Cate Blanchett.
Ps. As a reminder, here’s Philip Seymour Hoffman being just great as Freddie Miles:
Tiggerlion says
I thoroughly enjoyed it. I loved the slow pace, the long interludes going up and down stairs, the wonderful black and white cinematography and the fabulous Italian backdrop. I liked the fact the actors were less young and beautiful than in the movie. I also had no problem with the casting of Freddie, who, after all, is an exotic flamboyant creature and unpleasantly arrogant.
I could watch it all again.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
You and Gary should get a room, it’s like you were meant for each other
Tiggerlion says
😘
Gary says
I’d like that. I imagine it would be a bit like The Assembly, with me instead of Michael Sheen and Tigger asking me all sorts of neurodivergent questions.
Tiggerlion says
Are you afraid of bats?
Lodestone of Wrongness says
And with that we must respect their privacy and, thankfully, draw the curtains
Gary says
Will this do?
#oldjokesarethebest
Moose the Mooche says
God, I loved the 90s
MC Escher says
I haven’t seen it. Is it any good?
Tiggerlion says
I thoroughly enjoyed it. I loved the slow pace, the long interludes going up and down stairs, the wonderful black and white cinematography and the fabulous Italian backdrop. I liked the fact the actors were less young and beautiful than in the movie. I also had no problem with the casting of Freddie, who, after all, is an exotic flamboyant creature and unpleasantly arrogant.
I could watch it all again.
😉
However, I think Euron Griffiths book A Casual Life is more worthy of your time.
Freddy Steady says
Yep @tiggerlion
A Casual Life is excellent, I can’t imagine anyone here wouldn’t see themselves in it.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Gave in and watched Episode 1 tonight. Bit poncey, no?
Gary says
Hard to tell whether you like it or not from that comment.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Not sure but so far underwhelmed: all a bit poncey arty meaningful and
not one piece of gratuitous violence or one sight of naked breasts. I have no idea why I keep paying my TV Licence fee.
Jaygee says
It’s on Netflix
Lodestone of Wrongness says
That’s the sound of my joke falling flat…
Jaygee says
With material like that you’re a shoo-in for a series
of NF comedy specials
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Every one a winner.
Native says
Watched Ep1 to 3. Very much enjoying it. Don’t know anything of the books, so watching with no pre-perception.
Pace and photography reminds me greatly of the George Clooney film, ‘The American’.
H.P. Saucecraft says
I say, fellows! That opulent villa, however, is not actually in Atrani, but on the nearby island of Capri. Villa Torricella was built in 1902 in eclectic style – turrets, Moorish colonnades, pointed arches and twisted columns – for an earlier pair of American socialites, Kate Perry and Saidee Wolcott, who hid their gay relationship by portraying themselves as sisters.
(Tiny Quiz: what popular broadsheet newspaper was this lifted from? The article also mentions how the town is being swamped by Ripley fans – imagine the atmosphere!)
H.P. Saucecraft says
Hot girl-on-girl action here:
http://www.elisarolle.com/queerplaces/klmno/Kathryn%20Wolcott%20Perry.html
Hamlet says
I posted on another thread about this, not knowing this thread was here!
I thought Andrew Scott was terrific in this, and I think it worked with him being older than Matt Damon’s portrayal: it seemed like a last chance for the character to move on in the world. I can’t say I like Matt Damon much as an actor, and I thought his portrayal of Ripley was too sympathetic.
A tough role for Johnny Flynn as Dickie, though. I like Flynn, but he’s just miscast here – his portrayal comes across as too introverted and sensitive; he didn’t seem particularly spoilt or lacking in self-awareness. It was the role of a lifetime for Jude Law (an actor I don’t much care for usually), and he was brilliant in the film at capturing the spirit of the trust fund cad: totally spoilt, superficially fun, good looking and easily bored.
Flynn is portraying Richard Burton in a play at the moment; this would seem a much better fit.
Gary says
Flynn was miscast??? Whilst I am wholeheartedly agree, Freddie Miles was played by a female lady woman of the opposite gender! I don’t understand how it doesn’t bother fans of the TV series (which, I think we all agree, is not as good as the book or the film) aren’t bothered by the fact that Freddie Miles is obviously not what Freddie Miles is supposed to be gender-wise and yet no one notices! Is no one bothered by no one noticing things anymore? Have we become that blasè? Can anyone be anything and it doesn’t matter? Is this the future? I’ve written to the Daily Mail.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Never mind who played Fredina, the bus stop where Ripley waited was clearly marked “Stagecoach” ! I’ve written to my MP (somebody called Le Pen, I await his/her reply).
Hamlet says
I actually thought it was deliberate casting – an androgynous appearance adding to the questions of identity. Or am I overthinking it and missing the irony of an offspring of a multi-millionaire playing a rich, spoilt type?
Tiggerlion says
I’m with Hamlet on this one. The casting of Freddie works well in my view.
I haven’t read the book but I much prefer this series to the film.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
I agree with Hamlet and Tigger. Gary is a fool.
Gary says
That’s as may be, but anyone who prefers Ms Sumner’s casting or performance to Philip Seymour Hoffman’s is certifiably insane.
Gary says
S’bizarre Atrani is being swamped by Ripley fans as neither the book (which is much better than the TV series, good as that may be) nor the film (which is also much better than the TV series, good as that may be) are set in Atrani. They’re both set in the fictional town of Mongibello, though I suppose that’s a bit harder to visit on account of it not existing and everything.
Jaygee says
It doesn’t seem to deter Harry Potter fans.
That said, the more deluded of that particular group are credulous enough to turn on JK Rowling for questioning whether a male rapist who claims he is a woman should be sent to a women’s prison
Gary says
Now I’m not saying Freddie Miles is a rapist (though, frankly, I wouldn’t put it past him), but if he were there’s plenty here would have no problem with him being sent to a woman’s prison
Jaygee says
Perhaps that’s why we have hardly any women “members”
H.P. Saucecraft says
Let me get this straight – Harry Potter is a rapist?
Gary says
Do at least try and stay informed, it’s hardly “breaking news”:
https://www.mugglenet.com/2022/06/consent-in-harry-potter-or-the-lack-thereof/
https://www.womensweb.in/2018/07/harry-potter-series-promote-rape-culture-july18wk1sr/
https://www.bustle.com/articles/159287-the-unexpected-way-harry-potter-perpetuates-rape-culture
https://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/harry-potter-fans-theorize-rape-sexual-assault-probably-huge-problems-wizarding-world.html/
H.P. Saucecraft says
Good grief. Rowling is literally worse than Hitler.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Saw the “must watch” Episode 3 last night. Beautifully shot, stunning acting – but it’s all a bit of a posh Miss Marple isn’t it? Entertaining stuff but nowhere near the hyped-up classic I was led to believe ….
Gary says
We are totes agree! Is that a first? It is indeed entertaining stuff but nowhere near the hyped-up classic you were led to believe. Now just add “and not as good as the film” and you can be me.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Me and Mrs – ” I know we’ve seen the film and we know it was good” but neither can remember anything about it. We have no idea what’s happening next apart from Ripley pretends he’s the dead bloke and it all ends badly. Perhaps. It’s like an Old Folks Home here….
Tiggerlion says
NO SPOILERS!!!!!
Lodestone of Wrongness says
No spoilers ? Everybody in the entire world apart from me has watched the bloody thing! (By god, it don’t half drag on – four long, long hours to go)
H.P. Saucecraft says
You should have bailed after the first episode, like moi. Everything you need – bar the ballcrushing tedium – is in that first show. The black and white photography. The stunning setting. The … did I mention the stunning cinematography? The black and white setting?
Jaygee says
The Minghella film is now on NF for anyone who’s not seen it, or wants to rewatch it and compare with the series
H.P. Saucecraft says
Jesus Christ though, Matt Damon is such a punchable twat. Should have been Jude Law in the lead role.
Jaygee says
I think they probably rejected that as. being a bit too obvious and played the two leads against type
Gary says
No, no, no! Dickie had to be better looking and more all-round attractive than Tom or the story wouldn’t work. Imagine, if you will, me obsessively drooling over H.P. Saucecraft. Can’t, can you? Because me and because H.P. Saucecraft. But the other way round and the whole thing becomes credible almost to the point of believability.
H.P. Saucecraft says
Nope. There are plenty of male leads who could have played Dickie without being eclipsed by Jude Law in the looks department. “Playing against type”? Nah, as well as nope. Matt Damon was miscast – Ripley has to have something seductive and charming about him, not be a geek, not be an ordinary blerk. He has to have a suggestion of evil about him, something dangerous, yet compelling. Matt Freaking Damon? Are you kidding me? Adam Sandler would have been better casting. But I’m thinking Jude Law as Ripley, Brad Pitt as Dickie.
Gary says
That could work. Or how about Harry Styles as Dickie and one of the Beckham kids as Ripley?
H.P. Saucecraft says
I don’t know any of these people and suspect you made them up, so when I say “ooh yes brill idea gar!” you say “hahalol joke’s on you I made them up!”
You must think I’m a damn fool.
Gary says
Yes, I do. And also, it’s just occured to me, why are we limiting our casting to males? Does Sting have no more daughters?
H.P. Saucecraft says
For the little ladies, I’m suggesting one with big knockers and one with slightly smaller knockers, for diversity.
Jaygee says
@Gary
Brooklyn would be shoo-in for “third plank from the right” in the wooden deck on Dickie’s yacht