" Sooner or later everyone has to take sides, if they are to remain human."
I don't keep a record of which films I've watched the most, but if I were to do so it would not surprise me one bit of Philip Noyce's The Quiet American came out on top. This is quite brilliant from start to finish - I love every single second of its 96 minute running time and a tenth, eleventh or twelfth viewing only serves to reinforce all that is exceptional with this adaptation of the short Graham Greene novel.
Noyce's film opens with Craig Armstrong's deep, aching strings playing over the opening credits. It's a soundtrack that pulls you in immediately, gripping you even before the picture has started. Noyce opens the film visually with shots of an opium pipe being lit, followed by a beautiful Vietnamese woman in a composite shot with a series of explosions. It is a such an elegant and simple way of adding a hint of foreboding that will hand over the entire picture. This sense of impending doom is further amplified by the haunting female vocal that accompanies the opening bars of Armstrong's brilliant score. The agonising, beautiful vocal gives way to Michael Caine's voice over. "I can't say what made me fall in love with Vietnam. That a woman's voice can drug you? That everything is so intense - the colours, the taste, even the rain." Noyce's challenge is filming this intensity, and making us fall in love with a place that has hypnotised the film's lead character.
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1 comment:
I watched this again on Thursday, and even with a birthday hangover it's still brilliant!
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