Ripley is a talent to believe in

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By Francesca Chapman
Philadelphia Daily News
Published: 1999/12/24


First, a few things you should know about the much-hyped "The Talented
Mr. Ripley," despite the press, the Oscar buzz and the incessant
trailers:

 *Don't be frightened, it is not a metaphor for America at the end of
  the millennium.

 *It is not this year's epic "English Patient," beautiful costumes,
  scenery and director Anthony Minghella aside.

 *And it does not feature a hot love triangle with Gwyneth Paltrow at
  the apex. Sorry.

So what is "The Talented Mr. Ripley"? A gripping, entertaining
thriller, full of fine performances, which captures a faraway time and
place like a dream.

The story opens in New York, in 1958, where piano player/men's room
attendant Tom Ripley (Matt Damon) is desperately working to improve
his station in life. He meets an old-money shipbuilding magnate who
gives him a chunk of money to bring home AWOL son Dickie (model-
handsome Jude Law).

Dickie, we soon see, is living out Tom's dream - hell, everyone's
dream: He's in Italy, reveling in the scandalous bohemian pastimes of
bebop and premarital sex, spending down his trust fund and totally
uninterested in working for a living.

"My father builds boats, and I sail them," Dickie shrugs to Tom,
introducing him to la dolce vita.

Soon, the two are in cahoots, Tom using his bounty fee to keep up
with Dickie and girlfriend Marge's (Paltrow) luxurious lifestyle. He
schools himself in their interests, lying when necessary to insinuate
himself into Dickie's good graces and gratifying doormat Marge by
paying her any attention at all.

But it's clear to the beautiful people Tom will never quite fit in:
His corduroy jackets, pasty complexion and limited income deny him
entree into the club. And though the heroically self-involved Dickie
flirts with women and men alike for his own amusement, he turns
frosty when Tom hints his interest in Dickie may be more than purely
buddy-buddy.

From then on, Tom does whatever he can to maintain his tenuous hold
on the perceived good life. And it gets bloody.

He travels up and down Italy, to one glorious location after another,
eerily impersonating Dickie, spending Dickie's money and spinning
increasingly resourceful schemes to maintain the illusion he's become
Dickie Greenleaf. The suspense builds -.with director Minghella
making the occasional nod to Hitchcock - as we wait to see if Tom
might get away with it. (The ending, ambiguous to the point where
you'll wonder what key scene you missed, is maddening, the film's
most serious flaw.)

Damon, as Tom, uses mimickry charmingly, then eerily, to cover up
his friends' disappearance and to become them. His complicated
performance is fascinating, as is Law's, his character swinging
mercurially from beneficent to ruthless.

At first, you may find Tom's behavior sociopathic but almost
forgivable: He first kills in self-defense, it seems, and his next
victim, well, maybe he was too rude or smug or rich to live anyway.

And you might root for Tom for a bit, just because he seems clever
enough to get away with it. But the escalating violence and Tom's
need to take innocent victims eventually reveal him to be a
monster, albeit one wearing beautiful clothing, surrounded by
beautiful people.