Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Nicole Kidman, Ed Harris, Gary Sinese, Wentworth Miller, Jacinda Barrett
Director: Robert Benton
Producers: Gary Lucchesi, Tom Rosenberg, Scott Steindorff
Screenplay: Nicholas Meyer, based on the novel by Philip Roth
Cinematography: Jean-Yves Escoffier
Music: Rachel Portman
U.S. Distributor: Miramax Film
I wish I could offer the some kind of praise for the new Anthony Hopkins/Nicole Kidman movie, The Human Stain. Unfortunately, what's on screen isn't deserving of more than a lukewarm recommendation. This is a case when the whole is less than a sum of the parts. If you deconstruct the movie, you'll find that certain scenes work well enough in isolation, but, when cobbled together with the uncertain, non-chronological dynamic employed by director Robert Benton, much that is good about The Human Stain evaporates. The film's two big flaws are readily apparent: a clunky screenplay and the miscasting of the lead character. As good an actor as Anthony Hopkins is, he cannot effectively play every role, and this is a part that should perhaps have been offered to someone of equal talent but with a lesser reputation.
The main thread of The Human Stain's tapestry unravels against the backdrop of the late-1990s Clinton/Lewinsky sex scandal. Coleman Silk (Hopkins) has just quit his job as a professor at Athena College after being accused of making a racist comment. Coleman rails against the idiocy of political correctness, but resigns anyway. His wife, shocked by the injustice of the charge and her husband's reaction, drops dead. Time passes, and Coleman decides that a book should be written about his experiences, so he approaches reclusive author Nathan Zuckerman (Gary Sinise) with the story. Nathan decides not to write the book, but he and Coleman become fast friends. Soon, Coleman is telling Nathan about the new woman in his life. He has fallen for a 34-year old named Faunia (Nicole Kidman), who works as a custodian at the college. She has a mysterious, tragic past and a homicidal ex-husband (Ed Harris). But, as Faunia begins to open up to Coleman, forceful memories of his own past surface, including those of his first love, Steena (Jacinda Barrett), and how he, as a young man (Wentworth Miller), used his extremely light-colored skin to expunge his African-American heritage and live as a white man.
By the nature of its subject matter, The Human Stain is virtually guaranteed to be controversial. Like Philip Roth's novel, upon which Nicholas Meyer's screenplay is based, the film deals with the issue of "racial passing," in which an individual of one race pretends to belong to another. It was a method frequently used by light-skinned African Americans in pre-Civil Rights days to circumvent bigotry. For Coleman, however, his decision to live his life this way ultimately becomes a trap.
The movie is also a May/December love story, showing how the sad-eyed, tough-talking Faunia rekindles Coleman's sexual nature (with a little help from Viagra). At first, their relationship is all about sex, but, as is wont to happen in situations like this one, the participants develop feelings for one another. As Coleman remarks, "She isn't my first love, or my great love, but she is my last love." The presence of Faunia's lunatic ex-husband adds an element of danger to the relationship, and, as the movie shows in the first scene, things will not end happily.
The Human Stain is replete with interesting material, but the manner of presentation short-circuits its potential power. It's not a bad movie, but neither is it as good as the thematic content would lead us to believe. The convoluted structure is a part of the problem. The movie opens with an unnecessary flash-forward which eliminates any degree of plot-related tension, throws in flashbacks to Coleman's youth at odd moments, and employs an overlong and unnecessary epilogue to sew up loose ends that don't need resolution. The ice-fishing conversation is especially odd and superfluous. What would have been lost if this scene had been cut?
Then there's the question of whether Hopkins is the right man for the role. He bears no resemblance whatsoever to Wentworth Miller (who could pass for a light-skinned black man), either in appearance or in voice (Hopkins retains his British accent, while Miller has none). For viewers, it is arguably a stretch to envision Hopkins as an African American. This is a case when an actor's reputation interferes with the character he is attempting to portray. Instead of seeing Coleman, we see Hopkins, and this makes it difficult (if not impossible) to suspend disbelief. There's also not much chemistry between Hopkins and Nicole Kidman. The red-headed actress does a credible job as the haunted Faunia, but she and Hopkins don't quite click.
Undemanding viewers will probably find enough intriguing material here to make it worth a look, but I was too disappointed by the wasted potential to be enthusiastic. When the film works, it does so admirably, but the screenplay and structure are too uneven to sustain any sort of momentum. The fault may lie in the complexity of the source material, but a movie should not be greenlighted until the script is perfected. What has reached the screen represents a disappointing early entry into the 2003 Oscar race.
© 2003 James Berardinelli