Eleni - Peter Yates

primo film di Peter Yates che vedo, per essere un film minore, si legge qua e là, c'è da leccarsi i baffi, merito sopratutto di una straordinaria Kate Nelligan, e anche John Malkovich non sfigura.
sembra una storia di Elia Kazan, fra Grecia e Turchia sono successe cose terribili, alcune sono arrivate al cinema.
qui un giornalista detective riesce a diventare corrispondente in Grecia, ma il suo obiettivo investigativo lo riguarda molto da vicino.
a me è piaciuto molto, mi direte - Ismaele

…there are still many fine qualities in Eleni. Some of them are not quite apparent until near the end of the movie, when the climactic scenes help us appreciate what before. In particular, there is a moment when Gage actually sits down at a table across from the man who killed his mother, and looks into that man's eyes, and tries to decide what to do next.

It provides the emotional payoff for all of the groundwork in the Malkovich performance: We see the decision of a man we have grown to know.

Malkovich is developing into one of the great strong quiet zones of contemporary film acting. His characters internalize their feelings.

Anger causes his voice to drop. And, when it rises, it seems as if feelings are being forced out of him.

The result is more effective than if he pounded on tables and waved his arms - choices some other actors might have made, given a volatile Greek-American to play. This is a character who has been hurt very deeply inside, and has spent years brooding on that hurt.

Kate Nelligan, on the other hand, provides a more demonstrative performance as Eleni. Her eyes flash, her temper flares, she is passionate in her care for her children.

She is among my very favorite movie actresses (remember her performance in "Eye of the Needle"?). But she is probably not quite right for this role, because she seems too finished, too sophisticated, for this woman who lives in a house with earth floors and goes to the well for her water in the morning. She tries, but she is too polished.

The movie's fatal flaw, however, is to ever show us Eleni in the first place.

What happened in 1947 is one thing. What Nicholas Gage does about it 35 years later is very much another thing, and has to do with memory and revenge, not with the literal rediscovery of the past that we get from flashbacks.

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…This powerful film, based on Nicholas Gage's best-selling 1983 book, graphically portrays how Greek Communists were willing to destroy families in order to bring their political ideals to fruition. Both the nonfiction work and Steve Tesich's screenplay reveal that zealots can make a travesty out of their crusade by betraying all their values that keep people civilized.

Kate Nelligan's performance as Eleni is a tour de force of dignity and strength under pressure. Her heroism — the willingness to lay down her own life to save her children — is presented with simple clarity and conviction. As Nikola, John Malkovich exudes a single-minded intensity and inner anguish. The film emphatically celebrates the bond between the boy and his mother — a tie made strong by the absence of his father. As a man, the hate he feels for Elen's killers burns away any emotional connection with his own wife and chilren.

In the end, Nikola regains his humanity by learning about Eleni's courage in the face of death and her unbounded devotion to him and his sisters. Love is the inheritance which frees him from the grip of the past and the role of the avenger. He is restored to his own family with a new appreciation of them.

Eleni is an extraordinary movie. Like The Official Story, it reminds us that political ideology — whether right-wing or leftists — that attempts to subordinate human life to its rigids demands is doomed.

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Un infortunio per Yates. Rincresce vedere un'ambientazione cosi' approssimativa, dei costumi delle acconciature davvero ridicole, con attori di tutto rispetto, che nn riescono a recuperare il film.Il doppiaggio in italiano è da dimenticare, con voci che risultano false da un 1 km di distanza.
Il mixer fra passato e presente è davvero sioccherello, e confusionario.. non capisco quello che può essere successo...!

Sulla trama

In giornalista di origine greca, cerca i colpevoli che hanno ucciso la madre 30 anni prima.. ma la vendetta.. è dura a digerire!!

Su Linda Hunt

Poveretta anche un po' ridicola, nella drammaticità della trama

Su John Malkovich

Non poteva fare molto in questo ruolo a lui estraneo, è molto spaesato

Su Kate Nelligan

Molto bella ma acconciata in maniera ridicola

Su Peter Yates

Un infortunio di percorso per questo regista anche interessante, non capisco come può essere successo

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