Maybe a Dinosaur, Just Not
Purple
MOVIE REVIEW | 'BARNEY’S
VERSION'
Barney
Panofsky, a Montreal policeman’s son, meets his third wife at his second
wedding, a gilded gala that he stumbles into halfway between his wayward
bohemian youth and his distempered dotage. Barney, played with shambling energy
and vulgar elegance by Paul Giamatti, catches a sudden, breathtaking glimpse of
Miriam (Rosamund Pike) and pretty much forgets about the unnamed ninny he has
just married (even though she is played by the lovely Minnie
Driver).
The
initial source of Barney’s attraction is obvious enough and is only affirmed by
the melodious FM-radio timbre of Miriam’s voice. You might, however, be tempted
to wonder what she sees in him. In addition to being freshly married, he is
short, tubby, badly groomed and drunk, brandishing a stubbed-out Montecristo
cigar along with his hackneyed pickup lines.
The
answer to this riddle comes obliquely later that same evening, when Barney
chases Miriam down aboard a train about to leave Montreal for New York, where
she lives. In her hands is a paperback copy of Saul Bellow’s “Herzog,” possession of which surely signals, at
the very least, a high tolerance for vain, verbose and vulgar Jewish men.
Barney —
the picaresque antihero of “Barney’s Version” — is, in more ways than one, a cousin
of Bellow’s Moses Herzog. He is the last surviving fictional brainchild and
alter ego ofMordecai Richler, a novelist who, like Bellow, was born in Quebec but who, unlike him,
stayed there, turning Anglophone Jewish Montreal into a northern sister city of
Augie March’s Chicago.
The
volume that the future (and eventually former) Miriam Panofsky carries is one
of many signs that the director, Richard J. Lewis, and the writer, Michael
Konyves, of “Barney’s
Version,” have
done their homework. In winnowing Richler’s 1997 novel into a workable screen
story they have preserved important details and added some new ones consistent
with their version’s altered chronology. (Paris in the 1950s, when both Richler
and the novel’s Barney sowed their oats and drank their wine, becomes Rome in
the ’70s).
But the
filmmakers have been, if anything, too dutiful, too careful, and the movie that
results from their conscientious, devoted labor illustrates the terrible,
paradoxical trap into which well-intentioned literary adaptations so often
fall. Mr. Lewis (an executive producer and director for the television series
“CSI: Crime Scene Investigation”), Mr. Konyves and the producer, Robert Lantos,
display admirable patriotism as well as devotion to their source material.
“Barney’s
Version” is explicitly dedicated to Richler’s memory, and also, by implication,
to some of the cultural touchstones of his native land. It pays tribute to the
Montreal Canadiens and also to a handful of Northern cinematic titans who
traipse across the set in obliging cameo. Yes, that was David
Cronenberg playing the hack director of a soap opera about a Mountie named
O’Malley. And if you are likely to crack up at the sight of Denys
Arcand (“The
Decline of the American Empire”) playing a headwaiter — I confess I did —
then “Barney’s Version” will not be a total loss.
The cast
is beyond reproach. Selecting Dustin
Hoffman to
play Mr. Giamatti’s father is a stroke of genius, since it throws into relief
the blend of intense
seriousness and wry self-mockery that they have in common as screen
performers. Scott Speedman twitches persuasively as Boogie, Barney’s gifted,
drug-addicted best friend, and Rachelle Lefevre has some seductive moments as
Barney’s first wife, Clara, whom he marries and loses in Rome. Bruce Greenwood,
foreshadowed early, arrives late as the canoe-paddling vegan radio producer whom Miriam will marry
after leaving Barney. (This spoils nothing, by the way. Most of the story is
told in flashback, so that the denouement of Barney’s story is fairly clear at
the start.)
It all
sounds like the stuff of a pretty good movie: a crowd of interesting
characters; a plot involving adultery, divorce, a grab bag of vices and even
the possibility of murder; art, sex, religion, hockey. But the film plays more
or less like a recitation of that list.
A few
extended scenes, in which Mr. Lewis stops fussing to put every detail in place
and stands back to let Mr. Giamatti spar one on one with another actor, have a
vivid, unpredictable rhythm. Unfortunately they serve only to highlight just
how inert the rest of the movie is, as if it were not Barney’s version of the
story at all, but rather the wedding planner’s.
In spite
of Mr. Giamatti’s ferociously energetic performance “Barney’s Version” never
figures out just who Barney is. In Richler’s pages he is above all a voice —
profane, sophisticated, tender, mean and funny — and the filmmakers prove
unable to compensate for its absence. But their failure is more than just
technical; in attempting to honor the spirit of the book, they extinguish it.
It is a wild, unruly novel of character, in which the character himself is at
once incorrigible and irresistible. The film tames and sentimentalizes him, and
in showing respect for Barney’s author turns his creation into something
unforgivably respectable.
“Barney’s Version” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or
adult guardian). It has sex and sin, without feeling especially sexy or sinful.
Barney’s Version
Opens on Friday in New York and Los Angeles.
Directed
by Richard J. Lewis; written by Michael Konyves, based on the novel by Mordecai
Richler; director of photography, Guy Dufaux; edited by Susan Shipton; music by
Pasquale Catalano; production design by Claude Paré; costumes by Nicoletta
Massone; produced by Robert Lantos; released by Sony Pictures Classics. Running
time: 2 hours 12 minutes.
WITH:
Paul Giamatti (Barney), Dustin Hoffman (Izzy), Rosamund Pike (Miriam), Minnie
Driver (second Mrs. P.), Rachelle Lefevre (Clara), Scott Speedman (Boogie),
Bruce Greenwood (Blair), Macha Grenon (Solange), Denys Arcand (a head waiter)
and David Cronenberg (a director).
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