Review
WICKER PARK
Starring Josh Hartnett, Rose Byrne and Diane Kruger
Directed by Paul McGuigan
Now playing
Check listings
Hollywood has a poor track record of remaking great foreign films. Such movies as Vanilla Sky (Abre los Ojos) and Insomnia (which, funnily enough, I slept through) have made it difficult for me to watch a remake without a heavy dose of skepticism and caffeine.
Wicker Park – the retelling of the 1996 French movie L’Appartement – is the story of a young man’s obsessive hunt for his phantom girlfriend. Matthew (Josh Hartnett) is about to marry, but his fiancée (Jessica Paré) is a cold, controlling woman and he is reluctant to finalize their engagement. We soon learn the reason for his cold feet. Two years previous, the love of his life – a typically adorable French dancer named Lisa (Diane Kruger) – disappeared without a trace and now he’s left to pine over her memory.
During dinner with his fiancée, Matthew thinks he sees Lisa flee the restaurant and becomes enamoured with the idea of finding her. Instead of leaving for China on an important business meeting, he begins to track the woman through the chilly streets of Chicago. It’s a mystery why Lisa disappeared and if the woman in the restaurant really was her. As Matthew turns from concerned boyfriend to impassioned stalker, the audience is left to wonder if what they see is true.
Wicker Park is a psychological thriller, based in the Hitchcockian style of dark realism, where one man’s infatuation turns into dangerous fixation. Director Paul McGuigan saves the movie from its confusing and implausible script by weaving a slow, complicated timeline, as the movie jumps back and forth through a two-year time period, telling the story through each character’s perspective. The film is visually impressive, with McGuigan successfully using stylish split-screen and freeze-frame effects to convey the feelings of frustration and disjointed communication. Things are kept just out of reach, as a series of misunderstandings, mistaken identities and near-misses keep Matthew and the audience from learning the truth.
However, the director seems to overuse this cinematic technique and at times, the movie comes dangerously close to Three’s Company territory.
Adding to that problem is the fact that Wicker Park is full of bad TV acting. Hartnett’s cardboard delivery ranges from sad to confused and his stiffness on screen makes it difficult to believe that the character is feeling anything at all. Matthew Lillard plays his standard funny-sidekick role, providing the required comic relief. Rose Byrne is a softer, gentler Glenn Close, becoming the well-meaning psychotic and Kruger is the stereotype of every man’s fantasy (limber, blond and having little to say). The cast is undeniably beautiful, but the actors do little to engage the viewer below the surface.
There is never any explanation for why characters act the way they do and the film’s central conflict could have been avoided if one of the characters had invested in caller ID. However, it will no doubt appeal to its target audience – teenage girls. The movie has a convenient Scooby-Doo ending (ironically Lillard played Shaggy in both film adaptations), but McGuigan does the best he can laying out the pieces of this puzzling movie. |
Copyright ©2004 FFWD. All rights reserved.