Girls, all I know about farming I learned from two films--"The Wizard Of Oz" (which we in New York are supposed to get a 75th Anniversary screening of, if they ever let us know; and how about "Gone With The Wind," which also turns 75, though Tara is a plantation, not a farm!!!!!!) and "A Thousand Acres." I have written plenty about the first; today, I am writing about the second, having recently reread Smiley's novel, and just watched the film last night.
I have got to do something about my hair, girls, because, for two women, like Ginny and Rose Cook, to spend twenty years of their lives working on a farm, then marrying, bearing children, and doing child raising, housework, and farming, yet still have the hair and skin of Jessica Lange and Michelle Pfeiffer is something I want to know about how it it is done. Because, if I could work on a farm, and look that good, I would leave New York right now.
This was one of the points my beloved and I disagreed on. You do not have to look like Clara Blandick as Auntie Em to work on a farm, but to look as good as Jessica and Michelle does strain a bit of credulity. But, who cares, when you are watching? Besides, it may inspire some of us girls to take better care of ourselves.
The film pretty much dramatizes the book, You get Ginny's (Jessica Lange) voice over narrations, which are taken directly from the book. The stunning cinematography of Tak Fujimoto manages to capture the panoramic land in a series of stunning shots that attempt to do visually what Jane does with prose. Both work equally well. And there is a haunting musical score by Richard Hartley that perfectly captures the somber mood of the film, worthy of the great Alfred Newman, or his son, Thomas.
And watch for some surprise appearances--Bob Gunton as the court judge; two very young up and comers named Michelle Williams and Elisabeth Moss as Pfeiffer's daughters, Pammy and Linda; Anne Pitoniak, as Mary Livingstone, who nails her one-line moment perfectly; John Carroll Lynch as the despicable epitome of small town virtue Ken La Salle, and the great Pat Hingle, as Harold Clark, Smiley's embodiment of the Duke Of Gloucester. One thing the film omits is the chemical accident to his eyes; another is Ginny's making canned poisoned sauerkraut and sausages fro Rose.
But with Michelle's histrionics, Jessica's internalized anguish, and Jason Roabards' rage, what more do you need???????? The men--Keith Carradiine, Kevin Anderson, and Colin Firth, all good actors and lookers--get in the way of things sometimes.
It is "King Lear," but it's not. Goneril and Regan here are shown to have been given a raw deal; their Lear figure is a rat bastard, and Caroline, the Cordelia of the piece, is an ungrateful little bitch. True, she does not know why she has to be grateful, but the look of self-righteousness every time Jennifer Jason Leigh appears on camera just goaded me no end. I wanted to smack her face. I also wanted to smack Jason Robards, as Larry Cook, for what he says to his daughters, during the storm. If anyone ever spoke to me like that, I would stab them seventy eight times, I would chop off their fingers, I would gouge their eyes out, then slap their face, I swear to God! But that's me!!!!!!!! Just as this film stirred up all my family scores that I still have to settle. And the sentence before it gives you an idea of how I plan to settle those scores.
But for the visuals, the stars, the score, and that marvelous storm scene, "A Thousand Acres," for all you may consider it flawed, (I think it is highly underrated!!!!!!!!!) bears watching.
When I first saw the film, I was so certain I was Rose. I have her anger and her sense of self-righteous confrontation. But there is a little of Ginny in me, who simply wants to look good, hang the wash out on the line, and make and drink coffee. Coffee is important to this film--it fuels the emotions of everyone in it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And, yes, I could serve people at Perkins, just like Ginny, at the end!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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