Far From Heaven Review
by John Ulmer (johnulmer2003 AT msn DOT com)July 15th, 2003
RATING: 3.5/5 STARS
FILM: FAR FROM HEAVEN
"Far from Heaven" is a closer look at the Leave it to Beaver families of the fifties and sixties. Everything was clean-cut, happy, cheerful...but underneath all this was the same pressure and troubles of today. People usually don't think of emotional pain during the fifties, but this film reveals it in true color.
Julianne Moore plays Cathy, a typical 1950s mother with a nice house, a nice car, and a nice family. Everything is nice. Until she decides to take her husband Frank (Dennis Quaid) some food to his office late at night, and finds him kissing another man. What I'm interested in is did Dennis Quaid really have to do that? I sure hope not. Anyway, he goes to a shrink, they try to get over the whole thing, but meanwhile a black gardener played by Dennis Haybert starts to make Cathy's world turn around. Soon the small town they live in starts spitting out rumors of Catchy having an affair with the black man, and Cathy's world slowly but surely begins to crumble apart.
Many say "Far from Heaven" is a moral story trying to teach us to look deeper into people. But I think that the ending of the film shows that everything is what it seems on the outside. SPOILERS. For example, what happens to Quaid's character and Moore's character at the end of the film is anything but a story trying to preach to look inside someone. Everything that is apparent from first glance is. Quaid's character Frank fights his "disease," as he calls it, but constantly has trouble staying away from that dark crevice of his mind that is homosexuality. Which leads me to something else.
I did not like the ending of "Far from Heaven." People applauded it for being anti-heroic, but something didn't click together. Yes, it is anything but a cliched ending, but it left me wanting a different and better, happier ending. I don't care if films are heroic; films are a form of art and expression, but also a good way of getting away from your life for an hour and a half, and this film just reminds you of what you came to forget.
But the rest of the film is well-crafted and intriguing. Film noir has never been done like this before. The sets aren't as convincing as, say, "Back to the Future," but the approach of the film is much more so. The main titles, the end credits, the costumes, the town, everything is detailed and very convincing.
But as soon as I try to praise this film too much, again the ending haunts me. I just did not care for the ending one bit. It's almost as disappointing as "Being John Malkovich's." I know, I know, I'll get some heat for saying that. But am I the only one left in society that does not like weird endings? I DO like depressing endings given the right type of film, but "Far from Heaven's" ending crossed over the line. It wasn't as depressing as it was disappointing.
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