The Talented Mr. Ripley

10/10

Another masterpiece complete with a bounty of intricate layers from the genius mind of Anthony Minghella. The film is a noirish triller yet it is also a perfectly crafted character study. As with most of Minghella's work, the bulk of the film lies in contrasts between characters. First there is the contrast between Ripley and Dickie. Ripley is a poor man who has lived his entire life in isolation, and dreams of having a life like Dickie's. Dickie, though, takes his wonderful life for granted. On the surface he is a joyous man who basks in the magnificence of his life, and Ripley loves this. He does whatever he can to become best friends with Dickie.

But slowly, he realizes that Dickie isn't the perfect man he originally thought him to be. He takes everything for granted, and this is mainly displayed through Marge. She is the perfect woman in his eyes, and he is jealous that Dickie can be with such a flawless creation. However, he sees that Dickie doesn't care about her at all. He sleeps with other women, and doesn't appreciate Marge for the glorious woman she truly is. This begins Ripley's turn towards Dickie.

The arrival of Freddie is a catalyst for the complete shift of Ripley and Dickie's relationship. The contrast of Freddie and Ripley is also a very interesting one. Ripley is a relatively dull man who takes everything in and appreciates what he has. Freddie, on the other hand, is extremely charismatic yet, much like Dickie, takes his luxuries and good fortune for granted. He is an immature, disrespectful man and Ripley sees this from the start. But Dickie becomes more drawn to Freddie's charisma, as a result of being so close to Ripley's dullness for so long. This makes Ripley even more angry, and it also leads Dickie to the realization that his friendship with Ripley has really played itself out and he has nothing left to gain from it. So, when Dickie decides to end their friendship, all of the bottled up anger and thoughts between the two of them come out and it ultimately leads to Dickie's death.

Instead of being overwhelmed with guilt and pain, Ripley sees this as an opportunity to live the life that Dickie took for granted. He takes over his life and lives it to it's fullest. In this fake life that he has created for himself, he even finds his own Marge in the form of Meredith. The similarities between the two of them are overwhelming, through appearance, personality, even the fact that their first names start with an M. But living his life as Dickie becomes more and more difficult for Ripley. Marge becomes increasingly suspicious when she runs into Ripley at the opera and his stories become more and more unbelievable, especially to the whereabouts of Dickie.

This all comes to another climax when Freddie comes back into the picture and realizes that Ripley is leading a fake life as Dickie. This leads to another necessary death in order for Ripley to keep his perfect life alive. But with another death comes more complications, and as Marge continues to be suspicious, the police start to close in on the truth. Ripley takes an opportunity to pick up and leave, leaving behind a suicide note as Dickie which claims that he also killed Freddie. However, Dickie's father hires a private investigator to investigate these curious deaths.

Eventually, everything sorts itself out perfectly for Ripley as Dickie's past comes to haunt him and everything becomes cleaned up with everyone believing that Dickie committed suicide and was responsible for the murder of Freddie. Marge, however knows the truth and all of her initial thoughts on Ripley are completely shifted into sheer hatred. Ripley ignores this though, and starts a new life with Marge's friend Peter. But living a life of lies still haunts him as Meredith finds him, believing him to be Dickie, on a yacht vacation with Peter.

So, once again another murder must be committed to keep himself free from prosecution. This one proves to be the most emotionally painful for him yet because, since Meredith is with people who have already seen Ripley there, he has to kill the new love of his life Peter who has done absolutely nothing wrong. The abrupt ending is certainly one of my favorites. It shows that Ripley's life of pain and isolation will never end due to his greed and life of deceit. The mistakes of his past ensure that he will never find complete happiness and the final image is one of pain and absolute isolation.

I didn't even talk about the performances, which are all amazing seeing as it's one of the greatest casts of all time. From Damon all the way down to Philip Baker Hall, everyone knocks their part out of the park. Jude Law's charismatic, seductive portrayal is surely the highlight as we delve further and further into his ultimately dark and selfish character. Damon, Paltrow and Philip Seymour Hoffman also deliver very praise-worthy performances. One of my favorite films.