A Closed Book

I had the chance to sit down and watch the 2009 thriller "A Closed Book" (aka "Blind Revenge") here in 2021. Sure, I hadn't even heard about this movie before now in 2021 as I sat down to watch it. But of course I opted to give it a chance, as it was a movie that I hadn't already seen before, and it also had Daryl Hannah on the cast list.

The storyline told in "A Closed Book", as written by Gilbert Adair, was actually interesting. Sure, this wasn't by any means groundbreaking material, but the story provided me with adequate and proper entertainment, so the movie did what it was supposed to do.

The pacing of the storyline was good, and director Raoul Ruiz did a good job at slowly piling on to the ongoing events and keeping the audience in the dark, guessing at what is actually going on here. So the movie wasn't a linear or predictable one, which certainly worked in favor of the movie.

"A Closed Book" is nicely carried by lead performs Tom Conti and Daryl Hannah. Now, it should be said that "A Closed Book" is a movie with a small cast ensemble, so there is a bit more pressure on each performer to deliver, and they certainly did so.

I am rating "A Closed Book" a six out of ten stars. This is definitely a thriller that is worth spending about an hour and a half on watching.

Saw this in a preview today. If you like Sleuth, then this is a poor man's relation. Very theatrical, and in fact best suited to the stage than the big screen, this film documents the mind games played out between a reclusive blind author and his new live in assistant. Daryl Hannah can't act for toffee in the latter role but does please the boys by getting her kit off, although how it advances the plot defeats me....Tom Conti plays the eccentric art critic author to a tee, and holds the whole thing together...just! Elaine Paige plays a very strange cameo role (the casting in this film is a little odd to say the least). Lots of Gothic overtones and a creaking old mansion in the country fit the stereotyped mould of the film but at least if doesn't overstay its welcome at 90 mins. Suspend disbelief and ignore the plot holes, and the film is weirdly enjoyable....

I like how well spoken the protagonist is. The thrills are not great, not terible. It's a luke-warm thriller with a not-so climatic ending that tries to be something but ends up unconvincingly. All in all worth a watch if you really have nothing else.

It is very strange to my mind that such a celebrated director as Raoul Ruiz is making straight-to-video movies in the UK! However the English-language world has a goldfish memory for foreign giants and so perhaps I shouldn't be so surprised. Maybe he needs to get Spike Jonze or Quentin Tarantino to "sponsor" him ^^. Nucingen House didn't even get a DVD release, so we shouldn't look a gift horse in the eye with this one.

So we have an art critic living in a country pile who has gone blind following some nasty maiming. He wishes to publish a final book and thus sets about hiring an "amanuensis" to assist him with this. Tom Conti plays the role of blind critic Paul pretty well, he has just the right mix of pomposity and fragility. The film is quite surreal, but nowhere more so perhaps than when we see a selection of self-absorbed characters interviewed for the position of amanuensis. In this country we never really hailed the arrival of the Surrealist movement, which is perhaps strange as we are about as surreal as it gets. So surreal that we understandably have problems rising out of the fog and making well-realised films about ourselves, although Patrick Keiller's London and Peter Greenaway's The Falls are notable successes. Yes the UK is a nightmare of prejudice, public conformity, self-repression, snobbishness, and reverse snobbishness; all the more bizarre as it's totally unenforced. British lives collectively are a myriad of uncorrelated banalities. We live in post-colonial anomie. Another example in the film is the political canvasser who is timid and petrified at the idea of engaging with someone on a non-superficial level, even if that were to be a well-to-do blind man, and even if that were, ostensibly, her mission. Our politics are quite funny, although we have again an ostensibly socialist party in government, it's just come to light that, in effect, Tesco are able to pay to get proposed legislation torpedoed!

The amanuensis (Jane) is eventually selected and is played by Darryl Hannah. She's fairly clearly hostile to him from the start, but is gentle enough in resting demeanour that it's clear we're seeing a vendetta from an aggrieved party, rather than the acts of a psychotic. There's a lovely example of female passive aggressive behaviour here, which, as someone who is as pompous as they come, though with a strong twist of self-deprecation that most don't ever seem to get, I have experienced myself. Jane sits listening to the usual enthusiastic and self-indulgent discourse, carefully choosing her moment to burst his bubble, when Paul mentions that it was always a bad thing to do for writers to drink, she coldly brings up Bukowski and Hemingway.

There is camera-work here, though the movie is obviously a quickie. The best example would be when the camera floats dreamily as we are told of Princess Diana's appearance in Bhutan. The opening shot of the spires of the pile are suitably surreal, however the atmosphere of the very comfortable gentrified interior is in contrast to that making the opener look slightly contrived. Being a quickie we also have a generic soundtrack over the top, which must have taken all of half an hour to select and edit in during post-production. I doubt anything was shot twice in the movie either, hence the zoom shots when Paul takes his glasses off, which are a bit silly.

For people who care about such things, the twist at the end regarding the critic himself, was pretty obvious in the first act if you are used to looking at paintings with anything other than a blank stare, or have knowledge about the meaning behind the travel itineraries of British men.

Though this is a quick production, done with a minimum of fuss and cost, there's enough artistic value to make this worth a watch. You even get to hear a good recital of the poem Jenny by James Henry Leigh Hunt.

There's a lot that blind people can't see, but motivations and misplaced items are not among them.

Veteran actor, Tom Conti, delivers an almost static performance, using his sonorous voice to good effect as the now blind art critic occupant of a rambling old mansion, played by Knebworth House.

He employs an attractive amanuensis, Daryl Hannah, to transcribe the ageing, irascible, misanthrope's final opus, "A Closed Book".

From the start we know that there is more beneath the surface, and the critic slowly becomes aware that his scribe is misleading him. She recounts the preposterous Madonna murder, the improbable O. J. Simpson suicide, and the laugh out loud conversion of Donald Trump to Islam.

She further gaslights the old man by moving familiar objects in his house, some of which he cannot be aware. But this is no narcissistic programme of dominance: it is a campaign of revenge.

What past trauma brought these two together? What profound loss has turned this otherwise pleasant woman into a relentless avenger?

This is a two hander, with three supports. The housekeeper played by the excellent Miriam Margolyes, a Conservative Party canvasser from Elaine Paige, and the literary agent, in a swansong performance from Simon MacCorkindale, have barely a scene each.

Raúl Ruiz's direction keeps the tension building, with some masterful camera work from Ricardo Aronovich. Adrian Murray's music is understated, being cliché horror on only a few occasions.

Don't be swayed by the negativity of some of the reviews; this is a worthy effort that will reward the hour and twenty minutes you invest in this dark, claustrophobic world.