SILK [R]
No one who saw this year’s Best Picture nominee Atonement could fail to be moved by its stunning images and intricately composed shots. Whatever its faults, the film painted picture after startling picture, which makes its snubbing for Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography and Best Direction for helmer Joe Wright all the more inexplicable. Atonement was able to move forward under the strength of its plot, but the same cannot be said for last year’s Silk, a period piece adaptation more pretty than it is moving. Still, period-drama fans will appreciate the beauty of the film for what it is, if uncoupled from action.
The film focuses on the courtship and relationship of French silkworm hunter Hervé Joncour (Michael Pitt of Hedwig and the Angry Inch) and his wife, the schoolteacher Hélène (Keira Knightley, taking a more passive role in this movie than she did in Atonement). Hervé left the army in order to marry Hélène, allowing himself to be courted by local silk merchant Baldabiou (Alfred Molina) into going on a series of missions to replenish the town’s supply of silkworms. As disease strikes litter after litter of the worms, Hervé is forced to leave his wife for longer and longer stretches, culminating in an overland journey to Japan, where he deals with a local warlord (Koji Yakusho) and becomes infatuated with his wife (Sei Ashina). As the political situation in Japan is destabilized, Hervé fears never seeing his mistress again, even while Hélène despairs over her inability to bear children.
The Chocolat meets Cold Mountain machinations of the narrative are driven by Pitt’s slow, dreamlike narration over gorgeous shots of foggy hills and lush gardens. Despite their inexplicable American accents, Pitt and Knightley have very good chemistry and make their continent-spanning love affair believable, even up to the overwhelmingly predictable finale. It’s not perfect, but some of its images are curiously indelible.••• –Ellen Wernecke
Ellen Wernecke is a contributor to EDGE, and her work has appeared in The Providence Journal and Publishers Weekly. She lives in New York City.
