A grand surprise
The Words
slipped into town on a raft of mediocre reviews and little hype. What a
surprise then to enjoy every frame of this carefully crafted movie. Expect to be
confused by the subtleties of plot, but do see it.
Clay Hammond
(Dennis Quaid) is reading his new book aloud to an appreciative New York
audience. The Words tells the story of Rory Jansen (Bradley Cooper), a
struggling novelist with an inbox full of rejection letters. On their honeymoon
in Paris, Rory and his wife Dora (Zoe Saldana) are browsing in an antique shop
when they spot an old brief case, a perfect fit for a writer’s aspirations. When
Rory discovers a manuscript inside, he realizes quickly that he will never be
able to write that well himself. And so the deception begins. He will retype it
as his own, submit it, and soak up the benefits of being an overnight sensation
courtesy of The Window Tears by an unknown author.
The
manuscript in the briefcase is a reminder of the loss in the 1920s of a suitcase
full of Ernest Hemingway’s work left in a Paris taxi by his wife Hadley, a loss
that contributed to the collapse of their marriage. A nice detail: as part of
the divorce settlement, Hadley was given the rights to the novel Hemingway was
working on at the moment which happened to be The Sun Also Rises.
Enter Jeremy
Irons as the unnamed author of the bestselling lost/found book. Once Irons is on
screen, everyone else seems to fade away. He creates a searing portrait of the
nameless Old Man in pain and sadness. You will be forgiven if you ask yourself
who wrote which book. Whose story is it that
gives us Rory Jansen or the Old Man? Clay tells us that the line between life
and fiction is very thin, a comforting reminder as we wrestle the question of
who is real and who is fictional. The only guarantee: you will leave the theater
with questions.
The movie
revolves around a marvelous moral question of literary theft and the character
of the men and women whose lives it upends. Nora Amazeder is fine as the young
French wife of the Old Man in his youth. Danielle (Olivia Wilde) creates a
graduate student whose fawning approach sprouts into strength in her later
scenes with Dennis Quaid. Zoe Saldana is a knockout as the fiery, devoted wife
to Bradley Cooper’s Rory, and Cooper himself is good as the compromised writer.
But the core of it all is Jeremy Irons who rivets us whenever he is on screen.
There are
faults and inconsistencies to be found here but the odd thing is that none of
them mars the very strong story; all are quickly forgotten. The overriding
reaction is one of gratitude to writers/directors Brian Klugman and Lee Stemthal
for spinning a yarn that rescues us with gusto from the barren summer season.
Copyright (c) Illusion