|
|
|
|
 |
|||
|
|
||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
| ||||||||||||
|
|
I Dreamed of Africa Review by
Elias Savada
Back on the
wide screen after winning her Academy Award a few years back for L.A.
Confidential, Kim Basinger has selected a biographical project to showcase
what is assumed to be an honest attempt to demarcate actress-defining moments,
be it battling invasive elephants, elusive poachers, or knuckle-headed
screenwriters. Unfortunately, she has chosen…poorly. Her new “star
vehicle” is a breath-taking but lackluster effort that will barely whimper out
of the box office, its death exacerbated by the implosion of anecdotes and
expected slaying by the sword of Gladiator
and it’s armies to the north. No great white goddess she. For director Hugh Hudson it’s been a long road back to
profitability, and it will stretch a little further when the final tally is in
on this turgid passionless travelogue. Chariots
of Fire, his enthralling 1981 debut feature set in the 1924 Summer Olympics,
earned more than $100 million in the United States, adjusted for inflation. His
sophomore, Africa-themed production, Greystoke:
The Legend of Tarzan, made about two-thirds that amount in current dollars.
Again, not shabby. His subsequent three films nose-dived: Revolution (1985), Lost Angels
(1989), and My Life So Far (1998)
barely grossed a cumulative $2 million in this country. Hudson’s adrift on the
Dark Continent again, searching for the holy box office grail, yet instead
finding that I Dreamed of Africa
offers up a rainbow but no pot of gold -- only lead. Based on Kiku Gallman’s 1991 autobiographical book,
screenwriters Paula Milne and Susan Shilliday (Legends of the Fall) have seemingly compressed her text into a
series of exotic animal scenes, stunning landscapes, majestic sunsets (all set
to Maurice Jarre’s lavishly overdone score), and an inflated story delivered
with enough wood to build the second Ark. Not a bad idea considering the
plethora of flamingoes, hippos, giraffes, birds, gazelles, lions, thirteen-foot
pythons, and other indigenous creatures depicted. Perhaps this film would have
been better conceived as a Discovery Channel or National Geographic
special. Belonging to the school of patchwork filmmaking, Africa
offers up an endless series of disconnected sequences strung together by
stilted voice-over witticisms (“I am at peace.” “I am alone.” “He is
my son. He is my friend.”) plucked from Kiku’s diary. I lost track of the
requisite, derivative montages: Arrival in Africa, Discovery of Dead, Poached
Animal Carcasses, Native Children Frolicking, Rebuilding the Ranch, Shooting the
Dog Off Screen, Playing in the Surf, Jeep Stuck in the Mud, Windstorm Destroys
the Ranch, ad nauseum. These would each devour a few minutes of screen time,
lurking the story forward. Two hours later, you’ll be hackneyed to death. Of course the whole project has that “been there, done
that” feeling. The film begs to be compared to Out of Africa, and the likening is in name only. Basinger and her
European co-star Vincent Perez (The Crow:
City of Angels, Indochine) can’t
hold a candle to Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. Too bad someone didn’t
realize before the cameras rolled. Kuki, an insecure divorcée, and her irresponsible lover Paolo get hitched in Venice after
a horrific car accident sidelines her for months of introspection. The
golden-haired bride’s dowry includes a then seven-year-old son (Liam Aiken
and, ten years later, Garrett Strommen) and her own memories of wonderful
stories of the African veldt as a child. Leaving behind security, civilization,
all her friends, reason, and a semi-overbearing mother (Eva Marie Saint), the
threesome hightails off to a rural, ramshackle part of Kenya for what is
supposedly “a fierce, passionate love story about the universal desire to
discover adventure, lose one’s inhibitions and meet the challenges of life.”
Some people can find the same thing by looking in their neighbor’s window,
which certainly would have been more entertaining. Kuki’s character, which allows Basinger several hanky-drenching scenes as tragedy beckons, yet never fleshes out the stick figure mold, while Perez doesn’t register with his weak role. Their relationship isn’t believable; it feels manufactured, especially when the now-noted conservationist delivers a limp confession to her mother “I love him mother. I really do” with as much emotion as air. Bernard Lutic’s lush cinematography is the only positive thing this overblown melodrama has going for it. I’d opt for a nice picture postcar Contents | Features | Reviews
| Books | Archives | Store |
|
|
