Oscar and Lucinda Review

by Seth Bookey (sethbook AT panix DOT com)
February 12th, 1998
Oscar & Lucinda

(Australia / USA 1997)

Have you even noticed the difference between vegetables that have been boiled and those that have been steamed? Boiling leaves them recognizable but drained of color and flavor; steaming makes the colors brighter, even brighter than they were originally.

This, dear viewers, is the difference between *Oscar & Lucinda* and its competition, the epic and ballyhooed *Titanic* and the enjoyable but superficial *As Good As It Gets*. What exactly is it that is so wondrous about *Oscar & Lucinda*? It's a confluence of storytelling, music, direction, and cinematography.

Set in the 1840s, the movie follows the title characters' lives from childhood on. Oscar is the son of a hardened fundamentalist minister who won't even refer to 25 December as Christmas because it's "papist!" and smacks his son for eating Satan's fruit (Christmas pudding), in the bleak but beautiful landscape of southern England. Lucinda grows up rather happy in New South Wales, Australia. Through various adventures and growing pains, they come to love God and gambling.

Ralph Fiennes is completely out of typecast here, looking less than handsome as the nervous jittery Oscar, with his scarecrow appearance and lack of haircut. Cate Blanchet is absolutely captivating as Lucinda, the woman of independent means who buys a Sydney glassworks. She lights up every scene she's in. It would be a cliche to say she is luminous, but she is. Also wonderful are Tom Wilkinson (recently seen in *The Full Monty*) as the Anglican minister Hugh Stratton and Clive Russell as the strict Theophilus, Oscar's father.

While some might find the story lacking, the music and the cinematography are really extraordinary. Watching *Oscar & Lucinda* is like eating a ripe fruit, or steam vegetable, and this is due to director Gillian Armstrong, whose career has included *My Brilliant Career*, and more recently a remake of *Little Women*--she's an Australian national treasure.
What we see is not the typical romance, but a true love story with vivid characters doing things that are simply not acceptable in the 19th century, and how they come to rely on each other. This is no ordinary cookie-cutter romance with situation comedy e elements thrown in. If anything, it's a situation tragedy with people who are 99.44% pure, and a church that floats. While there are some slow moments and uninteresting subplots, Oscar and Lucinda is anything but typical, and the turns it takes are real, and moving, and shown with a strong sense of empathy.
Based on the novel by Peter Carey; screenplay by Laura Jones. Cinematography by Geoffrey Simpson, music by Thomas Newman.

----------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright (c) 1997, 1998, Seth J. Bookey, New York, NY 10021 [email protected]; http://www.panix.com/~sethbook

More movie reviews by Seth Bookey, with graphics, can be found at http://www.geocities.com/Athens/2679/kino.html

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