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Far From Heaven
(Reviewed August 26, 2002, by James Dawson)
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Director/writer Todd Haynes set out to faithfully mimic all of the very worst traits of a mediocre Eisenhower-era melodrama in this 1950s period piece: obliviously wooden acting, ineptly earnest dialogue, a
cornball "socially relevant" plot, a garish Technicolor palette, and even a sickeningly swelling string-heavy score. It's as if he set out to prove that it is indeed possible to make a bad movie that looks and
sounds just like a bad movie that could have been made 50 years ago, without adding any kind of contemporary reflection, irony or humor to give the project a reason for existing.
As a technical exercise, I
suppose that means he succeeded...because this movie is convincingly dated, woefully irrelevant and wholly pointless. It arrives obsolete on arrival.
As much as I disliked "Pleasantville," at least that
movie tried to twist the way that bygone era was portrayed by the media of the day. All that "Far From Heaven" does is reproduce the very cliches and conventions that were weaknesses then and are nothing better or more ennobling
than "camp" now.
Julianne Moore and Dennis Quaid are an upper-middle-class suburban couple with two "Father Knows Best" kids and marital problems. Spilling the specifics would spoil the soap-opera plot,
which probably already has been ruined for you elsewhere. Haynes' main directing talent consists of aping the "POV through branches with leaves" shots of the day, and the cinematography is almost
intoxicatingly lush.
The worst thing about seeing a movie like this in a theatre is that you are guaranteed to be subjected to the fake, forced guffaws of "watch-me-laugh" would-be hipsters in the audience. Think of
annoying doofuses like Richard Roeper (or, as I like to think of him, "Roger Ebert's Dan Quayle"): the kind of insecure fools who think they must loudly acknowledge every painfully obvious reference to
the past to prove they "get it." The fact that there is nothing in any way subtle to "get" in this movie won't stop them from horse-laughing at the color-schemes, giggling over the costumes, and chortling
every time someone says the word "negro."
In the hands of a John Waters, this movie could have been a real kick, with all of its sappiness and garishness amped up to the point where it became funny instead of relentlessly boring.
If Todd Haynes wants to continues in this vein, maybe
next time he will do a beach party movie on an indoor soundstage, or make a monster movie with a guy in a rubber suit, or simply sit at home executing Elvis-on-velvet paintings. Let's hope he chooses the third option.
Back Row Grade: F
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