Closer

Mike Nichols, USA, 2004
3.5 out of 4 stars

Although I’m sure I’ve read it somewhere, I don’t think I needed to be told that this was a film adaptation of a play. The film only contains four characters, and it is composed of a finite number of lengthy, talky scenes. Just because it’s obvious, however, doesn’t mean that this is a bad adaptation; in fact, it’s quite the opposite, as I felt that Mike Nichols found a very good balance of cinematic and theatrical sensibilities in this piece.

The stagey origins of this film comes out is through the deliberately artificial quality of some or much of the dialogue. The characters often speak to each other in various series of incisive, if improbable, questions and answers. Julia Roberts is the weakest link, to a point, but overall the actors manage to make this style work, and they therefore make the film possible. As for the plot, I’m not sure if I took it as seriously as I was supposed to; for instance, was I really supposed to take the online sex chat as comedy? I think the piece does succeed in being emotionally involving and engaging, nonetheless, and I suspect, speaking as a lover of the theater, that this play probably works better on screen, with the breathing room it gets through the sets, the outdoors, and Nichols’ camera angles. On a stage, it seems like it could become stultifying.

Source: Sony DVD
19 October, 10:22 PM