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Based on a novel
by John le Carre, The Constant Gardener is a traditional
mystery/thriller/love story, intensified by the contemporary edge of director
Fernando Meirelles (City of God),
helming his first English-language production. Enhanced by stunning cinematography (Cesar
Charlone), the film is solidly grounded in a script by Jeffrey Caine that provides both
propulsive narrative momentum and solid characterizations.
Diplomat Justin Quayle (Ralph Fiennes) and his young, outspoken,
political activist wife Tessa (Rachel Weisz) are stationed in Kenya where her concerns
with native poverty and the AIDS pandemic lead to some startling revelations about the
practices of an avaricious and unscrupulous pharmaceutical company (redundancies, surely)
engaged in inhumane, abusive practices. And, as is not unusual in a le Carre story,
a jaded and amoral political establishment plays co-conspirator to corporate greed.
The film interweaves love story and political intrigue as Quayle delves
into the mystery of what happened to his wife and what it was she had learned. Jumping
back and forth in time, Caine's screenplay is skillfully woven, gradually uncovering
pieces of information that move the story forward with clarity and, step-by-step, reveal
the complex collusion between political and corporate miscreants. At the same time, Quayle
is faced with revelations about Tessa that stringently test his perception of their
relationship.
Fiennes (Spider,
The End of the Affair)
and Weisz (Runaway Jury, Enemy at the Gates) bring
warmly bubbling screen chemistry to the couple, a love that is perhaps an attraction of
opposites on the surface, but a meeting of hearts and principles of integrity underneath.
But it is Fiennes who gets to demonstrate the greater and more subtle range of emotion as
he picks his way through clues that force constant shifts in his understanding of what
happened and what that says of their marriage.
Meirelles offers handsome African landscapes, from natural geographic
beauty to shantytowns bursting with color and vitality. In contrast, scenes in London and
Berlin suggest cool European civility, laced with irony as underlying corruption is
exposed. In African scenes he utilizes a nervous, handheld camera that captures the energy
of these exotic locales; he also takes the time to let the camera linger on native faces.
Meirelles' evocative ability to create a sense of place, in both European and African
locations, adds an integral cinematographic element to the skilled performances he draws
from his cast and the solid storytelling at the heart of The Constant Gardener.
- Arthur Lazere
