The Quiet American

Entertaining picture dealing with a central romance along with thrills , political details and warlike deeds about Vietnam war . A young naive American named Alden Pyle (Brendan Fraser) and a cynical older British journalist called Fowler (Michael Caine) disagree over politics in 1952 Vietnam and over a beautiful young native girl called Phuong (Do Thi Hai Yen) . As a ¨quiet American¨ with dark secrets arrives in Saigon with his own plan to settle country's conflicts . As it's not clear whether Alden Pyle is just what he appears , as he seems to be an innocent Young American opposite the older, cynical Brit Thomas Fowler . Eventually Fowler must confront moral conflicts and the relationship between Pyle and him reaches some problems connected with a Vietnamese General , at the same time the war and a political upheaval take place .

Interesting second rendition of the Graham Greene novel including a love triangle , emotion , wartime events and many other things . The picture relies heavily on the love triangle between the ironical British reporter , his enticing mistress and the strange quiet American , but it doesn't boring , neither tiring and nor dull . Michael Caine is good as a correspondent covering a conflict and finding himself becoming personally involved when he befriends an American who is not all that he seems to and also falling for a beautiful young Vietnamese , a mesmerizing Do Thi Hai . The movie has its touching moments found primarily in the superb performances from trio protagonist . The film ends with newspaper stories written by Thomas Fowler about Vietnam from 1954 to 1966. However the book on which the film was based was published in 1955, so these are mostly events which happened after the book came out . The US release of this movie was delayed for more than a year by the terrorist attacks on the USA of 11 September 2001. The producers were concerned that it would be seen as anti-American.

Miramax had paid $5.5 million for the rights to distribute the movie in North America and some other territories, but then shelved it for a long time. Miramax even planned to send this movie to go straight-to-video. But Michael Caine successfully persuaded Miramax to screen this movie at 2002 Toronto International Film Festival; the movie received many good reviews at the Film Festival, so Miramax decided to release this movie in the United States theatrically . This handsomely mounted flick was well directed by Phillip Noyce , a successful Australian director who filmed Dead Calm (1989), starring Nicole Kidman, Sam Neill and Billy Zane , it brought Noyce to Hollywood, where he directed 6 films over the next decade, including Patriot Games (1992) and Clear and present danger (1994) starring Harrison Ford, and The bone collector (1999), starring Oscar winners Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie.

The first version with a very good cast such as Audie Murphy as the American , Michael Redgrave as Thomas Fowler , Claude Dauphin as Inspector Vigot , Giorgia Moll as Phuong Bruce Cabot as Bill Granger resulted to be more a killing mystery than the political/drama intented , while this last retelling turned to be more faithful to Graham Greene than Joseph L. Mankiewicz's 1958 take on . In fact , in Europe, director-writer Joseph L. Mankiewicz was savagely attacked for his film's infidelity to the source novel by Graham Greene, not least by Greene himself. The screenplay essentially turns the novel inside-out, so that the blundering "quiet American", whose extreme naiveté causes tragedies .

Phillip Noyce achieves a remarkable triumph in his version of The Quiet American by staying true the Graham Greene's text. Christopher Hampton's adaptation of the book never strays away from the basic premise of the story. This film in someone else's hands would have probably evolved into a war epic. Noyce and Hampton stay focused on the two main characters, who, after all, are the key to the story.

It's hard to think Thomas Fowler was not tailor made for Michael Caine. He was born to play this part. His characterization of this troubled soul is remarkable. Mr. Caine gets the essence of Fowler without any effort, or so it seems. He is a jaded man who understands the Viet Nam before the American involvement. He knows he can't go home again to a loveless marriage, one in which he will not be able to escape after having experienced things he never would have thought possible in starchy old London.

Brendan Fraser is an actor with a lot of experience in the theater, even though his choices in films leave a lot to be desired. As he proved with Gods and Monsters, he can hold his own against a great British actor such as Ian McKellen, or on an equal footing with Michael Caine in this film. His take on Alden Pyle is as vicious, devious and sly as Graham Greene made him out to be. Mr. Fraser gets under the skin of Pyle with such flair in the creation of this enigmatic man.

The rest of the cast is not up to the two principals, but it's the confrontation between Fowler and Pyle what really makes this a tremendous acting feast.

Another one to file under "very well made but a little disappointing."

First of all: it looks pretty good, as Noyce is a talented visual director. There was one slightly cheesy explosion of a model that looked straight out of a 60s Godzilla film though- those substandard effects don't bother me in old monster movies, but they feel more noticeable in super serious romantic thrillers from the 2000s.

Michael Caine is very good, and I like seeing old Michael Caine offered a lead role, because for the last 20 or so years, it feels like he's always a supporting player. Brendan Fraser is good at first- I know we all stan and love him nowadays, but I do think he felt a bit out of his depth in the film's second half. His character is given more complex things to do as the plot gets more intense, and I didn't think he had the acting chops for it, sorry.

Also, the music is as a little overblown, and the female lead very underdeveloped, which made the romance angle a bit underwhelming. So it moves well, looks mostly nice, and has a strong lead performance, but it doesn't coalesce into something great. Was going to say this is the kind of movie that should be remade, but I guess this version already was a remake?

Oh well- remake it again! Give it three strong lead performances, more time to flesh out the lead female role, and maybe don't give away the ending at the start and we'd have something really good (I do think revealing the climax and then flashing back sometimes works, like in Double Indemnity, but here, it just robbed the film of most of its suspense and emotion to be honest).

The story starts with the body of American Adrien Pyle , a medical specialist , being found in a river in Saigon . He has been stabbed to death and London Times journalist Thomas Fowler recounts to the authorities how he knew the man

TQE is a very strange film to comment on simply because I get the feeling that it is based on a very complex political novel by Graham Greene and it's interesting to note how many people on this page have commentated on how well or how badly it has been adapted to screen . It's also interesting to note that it was filmed in the spring of 2001 when George Bush's " war on terrorism " had not happened which clouds the issue more . People on the message boards have written many political threads to tie in with this but it's very interesting that Greene's original novel was written several years before Lyndon B Johnson sent combat troops to South East Asia , so Greene is criticisng American foreign policy in general and an intelligent , cogent way , not so much jumping on the fashionable bandwagon with Michael Moore , John Pilger and George Monbiot so I guess for that he deserves some credit

As a film what makes it so successful is with the casting . Michael Caine as we all know is a living legend and the fact that he has appeared in so many awful movies simply for the money while still retaining prestigious star quality speaks volumes for his talent and as you might expect in this type of role he's superb . What is even more amazing than Caine's performance is that of Brendan Fraser's as Adrien Pyle . I've just remembered how good he was in GODS AND MONSTERS and he's equally as good here as a man who's not what he seems to be . One can't help thinking how well he'd be regarded as an actor if he'd decided to skip THE MUMMY films which unfortunately seems to have prematurely killed his career . Certainly I wasn't reminded of Rick O'Connel while watching this

Where the film falters is - Again - where it shows its literary roots . There's no way you can confuse a Graham Greene novel with a Harold Robbins one , but there's maybe too much of a romantic subplot which gets in the way of the real story and you find your self questioning as to what the main story . Is it the political one or the love triangle ?

I don't understand why the studio satraps thought it necessary to embargo this film after 9/11, requiring persuasion on Michael Caine's part to get it to limited release now so as to qualify for Oscar nominations. The American role in Viet Nam is the subject of hundreds of books and countless articles - and not a few films. There is nothing unhealthy about the continuing debate and contrary to what some opine, I doubt American policy vis-a-vis Iraq has much lineal connection to the troubled saga of U.S. involvement in Indo-China, or its partial successor in hapless interest, the Republic of Viet Nam.

The Graham Green story has been filmed before (1958) but this is a pungent, attention-grabbing version, filmed in various parts of Viet Nam. The sultry and grasping humidity of the land almost comes off the screen. The story takes place in 1952 as the inept and poorly led French stumble towards their ultimate debacle at Dien Bien Phu (anyone interested in this story should start and finish with Bernard Fall's remarkable account of the French Army's Super-Alamo).

Caine, a Brit named Fowler, assures Brendan Fraser, a putative U.S. humanitarian officer named Pyle, that he is a "reporter," not a "correspondent." The difference to the easy-living Fowler is that the latter has a viewpoint, perhaps even a cause, while the former, as Sergeant Friday would say, only wants the facts.

This film really belongs to Caine and Fraser but one other character, the stunning Do Thi Hai Yep, Fowler's live-in girlfriend, deserves mention. She lights up the screen with both her calculating passion for, first, Fowler and then Pyle. Her character is realistically complex: I knew a number of such women when I was an Army officer and although the phrase isn't used here, she's a perfect example of the desperately ambitious, beautiful mistress whose only long-term goal is to be taken to "The Land of the Big P.X."

A series of experiences transform both Fowler and Pyle. Several of the scenes of violence are real enough but the music is intrusive. You don't hear music when people are dying around you. At least not performed by an orchestra.

This is the third recent film in which Michael Caine distinguishes himself by the depth of his acting (the others being "The Cider House Rules" and "Last Orders"). Caine's Fowler leaves us wondering as to what his motives are as he slowly changes before us. There's no clear answer and room for argument. His Fowler is both disturbing and ingratiating.

The audience in the East Village theater where I saw "The Quiet American" today clearly was made up of folks whose minds were settled as to U.S. involvement in Indo-China, never mind the later escalation in Viet Nam. Their grunts and laughs at certain points reflected their views. But the story told here is a faithful mirror of what in 1952 were complex questions in a scary world made scary by communism, not the liberal democracies. That mistakes of a grievous nature were made may be clear today but the road was ill-illuminated then. This film, and Caine's portrayal in particular, reflects the contemporary confusion and the unravelling of any hopes for a peaceful reunification of the two Viet Nams after the French defeat.

I hope this film gets a very wide distribution after it finishes its two-week Oscar-qualifying run.

8/10.