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DVD Festival: Notes on a Scandal, The Queen, 28 Weeks Later, The Painted Veil

by Kathryn Durfee, Jamie Henson
05/22/2007

Kathryn:

What was she thinking? This is not only the title of the original novel that inspired director Richard Eyre's new film Notes on a Scandal, but it is also the question that most frequently crosses the mind of the viewer.

Notes on a Scandal is a masterpiece of acting and character study thanks to both stars, Cate Blanchett and Judi Dench. Blanchett portrays Sheba Hart, the new art teacher at a boy's boarding school. Feeling stuck in a marriage to an older man and trapped by her unpleasant teenage daughter and mentally challenged son, Sheba enters into an illicit and adulterous affair with one of her fifteen-year-old students.

Observing this affair is Barbara Covett (a fitting name), an older professor who is recording Sheba's every move in her journal. Her obsession with Sheba does not stop at mere interest in the woman's crime. Covett desires Sheba for her own and will use her knowledge and Sheba's trust to bend the new teacher to her will.

Dench is delightfully creepy as the lesbian spinster Covett. She manages to turn her disposition from doting grandmother figure to vicious and jealous lover in the blink of the eye. Likewise, Blanchett performs beautifully as confused and troubled Hart. Over the course of the film, viewers observe Blanchett internalizing Hart's struggle, trying to justify the unjustifiable. Ultimately, Hart must confess her crime and take responsibility for her actions, but can she break free of Covett's hold over her?

Notes on a Scandal features a screenplay written by both novelist Zoe Heller and playwright Patrick Marber, best known for Closer, another study of illicit relationships. This past Oscar season, Blanchett was nominated for both this role and her role in Babel. As her performance in Babel consisted primarily of writhing on the floor after being shot, it is unfortunate that the Academy overlooked this stunning and emotional performance. The film received three Oscar nominations for Dench, Marber, and composer Philip Glass.

In an odd way, Stephen Frear's The Queen serves as a companion piece to Notes on a Scandal. The main action, though it is so quiet and understated that it can hardly be called such, surrounds the reputation and death of Diana, Princess of Wales. While Queen Elizabeth wants to keep the royal family separate from the Princess's love affairs and tragic death, the Prime Minister Tony Blair believes the royal family should support a public funeral and memorial for "the People's Princess."

Thus, The Queen is not only a study of the differences between the very private and regal Elizabeth and the public and unpredictable Diana but also a battle of wills between the Queen and her people's Prime Minister. The film functions as behind-the-scenes peek at the atmosphere in the Palace after the tragic car accident that left the future king without a mother and the tainted the royal family through her affair with Dodi Fayed.

The film is a combination of real footage of the Princess and the overwhelming response of her fans and the dramatized action of Mirren's portrayal of Elizabeth. The news footage reminds viewers just how frequently the media hounded Diana and recalls the outpour of grief at her death.

Despite the public's desire for a public service, Elizabeth remains firm in wanting no part in Diana's funeral. However, it is soon decided that the Queen Mum's funeral plans will be used as a guideline for Diana's funeral, with foreign dignitaries and members of the royal family replaced with celebrities. The battle continues between the Queen, steeped in tradition and maintaining an aloof attitude towards the public, and Blair, worried that the royal family's treatment of Diana's death will be detrimental to the people's opinions of the monarchy.

While The Queen, like Notes on a Scandal, could have been lost in gossip and tabloid-style exploitation, both films artfully transform public events into private matters. The only difference is that The Queen depicts a real event and its effects on public figures. Mirren's portrayal of Elizabeth is masterful. She delivers a carefully-written script deliberately and respectfully, as if each word has been thought out and measured. The film offers viewers a glimpse of the real Elizabeth, a sharp older woman who enjoys driving her own Range Rover and taking the dogs out to stalk on the royal grounds. Mirren won the Academy Award for Best Actress this past year, and the film raked in another 50 wins from various film societies and festivals.

Jamie:

This past week has been spent watching the destruction of populations due to the cholera epidemics of the early 20th century to the impending World War Z of the 21st. One thing is for sure: I'm not getting on a flight to London anytime soon; 28 Weeks Later has made it official. The mere thought of running is nauseating, even worse if the running is from zombies. Especially ones that move as fast as cheetahs, foam blood like rabid rottweilers, and vomit more than an entire frat party. However overwhelming my fear of zombies is, I had to go see 28 Weeks Later, the sequel to my favorite zombie movie (and if you don't know that it's 28 Days Later, you need to crawl out of the cave and into the light we call the 21st century!).

The story picks up in the time frame of the first installment, with Don (Robert Carlysle, Trainspotting) and his wife Alice (Catherine McCormick, Spy Game) in a rural London cottage with four others. They are discovered and ambushed and Don is the only one to escape unbitten. This reintroduction grabs you as if you never left the theatre in 2002. The story then jumps ahead six months to the U.S. Army-controlled London. The city is infection-free and is now home to 15,000 people.

Don, some sort of utility controller, is reunited with his teenage daughter and young son that apparently escaped the epidemic to a safe camp. The kids venture into their old neighborhood, a restricted district, to recover their things and (unintentionally) unleash Hell, again.

It is really disappointing that Danny Boyle turned down the director's seat to be an executive producer even with the decent job done by Spaniard Juan Carlos Fresnadillo. Fresnadillo is no newbie to dark thrillers, with 14 awards for the feature Intacto and short Esposados. He has an up-close, gory, speedy, and loud visual and auditory style that compares to Guy Ritchie (had Ritchie worked with zombies).

The film ends with the dogs running amok in France (sorry if you think I'm ruining it, but you had to see it coming). At this point I'm changing my original statement: I'm not taking a flight to Eurasia for a while. 28 Weeks Later doesn't quite fill the massive shoes Boyle established with the first installment - I mean come on, it's from the producers of The Hills Have Eyes II - but is definitely worth the theater visit just to see Begbie even more crazy-eyed.

The Hellish nightmare of the Rage virus can only be beaten on the disturb-o-meter by the Hellish reality of Cholera (or the DMB virus, we aren't sure yet). The Painted Veil is set in 1920s China with cholera spreading. Walter Fane (Edward Norton, The Illusionist) volunteers himself to be a doctor in a small village. Walter forces his spoiled London wife Kitty (Naomi Watts, King Kong) to go to the village or face the disgrace of divorce for her debaucheries. The story focuses on Kitty's struggle to mature and the rebuilding of a nearly destroyed relationship.

Director John Curran, who captured similar adulterous tension in 2004's We Don't Live Here Anymore, has a talent for using the camera to successfully replace the speaker of W. Somerset Maugham's novel. The vivid visuals contribute as another, of the already numerous, literary devices of the film. I do have one complaint: I should never hear Edward Norton attempt an English accent ever again for the rest of my life. But with that one setback aside, The Painted Veil is an entertaining movie on the pains and pleasures of love in secluded harsh reality.