Strapless

If a director wanted to make a movie using the popular conception that what men want is sex, all that would be needed would be an attractive actress and a little bit of a story line. But what if the director wants to turn the tables and make a movie out of the popular conception that what women want is romance? David Hare did and produced the gem Strapless. An ordinary women on vacation meets a handsome, cultivated man who turns out to be attentive, generous and is well versed in the fine art of the pursuit. He is wealthy, has titled friends, is loving, devoted and kind and is surrounded by an aura of mystery with just a hint of danger. In short, the average women realizes the answer to any woman's yearnings, the perfect romantic partner. After meticulously creating the fantasy, Hare shows us the outcome. Blair Brown projects a sense of wonderment that this could be happening to her while Bridget Fonda, early in her career, deftly provides the dose of reality needed to support the romanticism. Bruno Ganz is, in the words of his on-screen foster mother, that rare man that loves women. Carefully scripted and well acted throughout, Strapless is a keeper.

The film mesmerized me in the same way that the male lead tantalizes the female lead. There is something so focused about the silence in this film: penetrating looks, thoughtful glances, wonderment. Author David Hare uses the actors' eyes to reveal a woman's inner cravings and a man's use of silence as a manipulative tool. The title "Strapless" suggests the vulnerability of the characters. It is a romance done with mystery and charm.

Strapless is written by one of British theater's finest playwrights, David Hare. Strapless stars Blair Brown and Bridget Fonda as American expatriates in London. Blair and Bridget play sisters who are completely opposite of each other. While Blair's character is stable and a doctor, Bridget is unstable and unpredictable. The story gets bizarre with a stranger who courts Blair's character. His role gets bizarre during the film and it is never really explained away to me. Without spoiling a surprise, I don't think this film really lifts itself up from obscurity. They could have at least shown more of London, England.

Bizarre is probably the best word to use when describing this film. The plot lazily, and arbitrarily, bounces back and forth between totally under-written characters and indeterminate settings (at one point I thought some scenes were taking place in Monte Carlo), with barely a nod to coherence. Blair Brown, always fascinating, doesn't have too much to work with here; her character is woefully undeveloped. The mysterious stranger is nothing more than a stalker, and no reason is given for her falling in love with him other than the luxury he can offer her. Bridget Fonda has nothing to do; the scenes in the hospital seem straight out of another movie (or an episode of St. Elsewhere). Despite the flim's almost dizzying lack of sense, I could not, at times, take my eyes away from it. This film is redolent of the sort of warm-shadowed, color-flecked rococo headiness (just look at the title sequence) that is often associated with the culture of the late eighties (watch Bonfire of the Vanities- dont turn up the volume, or pay attention to the characters, just look at the sets). Perhaps the incoherence of the film added to this mysterious gauziness. In any case, I still cant believe this came out of David Hare (despite the presence of Blair Brown). A playwright I usually admire, Hare can go off track, and this is a definite instance of that. There is even a gratuitous, non-sequitur joke about actors, done in a set that includes a poster for a Hare play. This sort of in-jokeyness is completely out of place in a film that sets itself up as a psychological mystery/romance. Also, Nick Bicat's score is distracting, often building into pointless crescendoes in the middle of talky scenes. This movie is . . . . well, lets just call it a curiosity.

(1989) Strapless DRAMA

Written and directed by renowned author and playwright of such movies as "Plenty" and "The Hours", David Hare, with middle age accomplished female doctorate, Dr. Lillian Hempel (Blair Brown) who lives with her inspired model sister, Amy (Bridget Fonda) in England, with Raymond Forbes (Bruno Ganz) pressuring her for marriage who she may regret for the rest of her life.

It's one of those movies I do not remember too much about, and that I need to view it again, otherwise I would not have given it a pass which is a 60% some scenes may have worked for me while others do not.