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Strong and Moving!

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Best movie ever!

This is a brilliant piece of cinema, concerning marriage and mature relationships, as seen through the eyes of different people who are all connected through odd coincidences. The interplay between the characters and the different situations are fascinating.The acting across is terrific, especially Anthony LaPaglia as a cop with emotional issues, suffering from guilt after cheating on his wife. Certainly a very ambitious movie that is not afraid to get its hands dirty, but the way it analyzes different situations with such perception and tender care is impressive. It makes thoughts and emotional webs run wild in your head. I highly recommend it.

The lives of a number of married couples are put under the microscope in this drama that focuses on the emotional distances that develop between husbands and wives. Infidelity, grief and a lack of trust are just some of the reasons for such problems and their inability to communicate successfully is identified as the biggest single barrier to them resolving their issues. The typical tendency for women to want to talk things through and for men to keep everything bottled up is at the heart of their communication problems and the pain, despondency and heartache caused is absolutely immeasurable.Screenwriter Andrew Bovell's adaptation of his own stage play "Speaking In Tongues" is well-written, intelligent and thoroughly absorbing to watch and director Ray Lawrence's sensitive pacing is perfect for this type of material.When a woman's dead body is discovered in some bushes in a suburban area of Sydney, Australia, detective sergeant Leon Zat (Anthony LaPaglia) is assigned to the case and his investigation brings him into contact with a series of people whose lives are all connected (directly or indirectly) with each other.Leon is depressed, overweight and in the throes of a mid-life crisis that has made him feel totally numb. In order to try to feel something again, he has a one-night-stand (which happens twice!!) with Jane O'May (Rachael Blake) who's separated from her husband and disappointed when her assignation with Leon fails to develop into an affair. Leon's neglected wife Sonia (Kerry Armstrong) suspects that he may be cheating on her and consults psychiatrist Dr Valerie Somers (Barbara Hershey) to try to come to terms with her predicament.Valerie's got troubles of her own as she's been consumed with grief for the last couple of years since the murder of her young daughter and her attempt to ameliorate the situation by writing a book about the experience hasn't brought her any closure. To make matters worse, her marriage with John (Geoffrey Rush) has also become dysfunctional and she's started to suspect that he may be having an affair with her gay client, Patrick Phelan (Peter Phelps) who she finds difficult to deal with because of his unpleasant attitude.Jane's neighbours, Nik (Vince Colosimo) and Paula D'Amato (Daniella Farinacci) struggle to get by but have the type of trusting relationship that Jane envies. One night, when she sees Nik throw a woman's shoe into the bushes where the dead body was found, she reports the matter to the police and this puts Nik in the frame for the woman's murder. This, however, doesn't provide Leon with a simple conclusion to his investigation.This story of complicated relationships is haunting, realistic and subtle in the way that it's presented and captures beautifully the quiet despair of ordinary suburban people who are trying to cope with their problems whilst also having to meet the routine demands of their daily lives. Top class performances (especially from LaPaglia and Hershey) and some beautiful photography complement the melancholy mood of the piece perfectly and there are also a couple of Edward Hopper inspired scenes when Leon meets Jane's estranged husband in a bar and in a kitchen where he has a conversation with his sidekick Claudia (Leah Purcell). Overall, "Lantana" is a thoughtful and serious movie with well-developed characters that'll resonate most strongly with mature audiences.

"Lantana" is an Australian drama from 2001 about four couples in the Sydney area (where the film was shot). There are some important peripheral characters as well. The husband of the main couple is a detective going through a mid-life crisis (Anthony LaPaglia). His wife (Kerry Armstrong) knows something's wrong and is getting counseling. The marriage of the counselor (Barbara Hershey) is also troubled due to the death of their young daughter a couple of years earlier. The woman the detective is having a fling with (Rachael Blake) thinks her neighbor (Vince Colosimo) may be involved in the counselor's mysterious disappearance. This is odd because the suspect's marriage is, ironically, the only solid relationship in the story. The counselor's husband is also a suspect (Geoffrey Rush) and has insightful things to share about marriage with the brooding detective.The reason the film's called "Lantana" is because lantana is a tangled shrub common in Australia, which represents the entanglements of the lives of the characters. It also symbolizes marriage since lantana has a sweet but bitter smell; it's beautiful with its flowers, but has "stings"; its branches weave together in a complicated way and in the story a woman is caught in the complexity of it."Lantana" is the antithesis of big, dumb, effects-laden "blockbusters," which -- oddly enough -- often become boring with their overload of "exciting" things going on. "Lantana" effectively shows that ordinary life is more interesting and compelling, if done right. Human nature is explored through a blend of passionate emotions, misconceptions, betrayals, anger, premature conclusions, vanity, duty, ethics, honesty, loyalty and repentance.Two of my all-time favorite dramas are "Grand Canyon" and "Snow Angels". I place "Lantana" in their company. That's how good it is.The film runs 121 minutes.GRADE: A

I find it rather ironic that in the past six months I've been writing reviews on this site, I haven't reviewed an Australian film. Lantana is the first one I've seen since I started and it was also quite an interesting film, so it gets a review.Lantana (so named after a plant that features prominently in the film's Sydney setting) is half mystery, half ensemble drama. It opens with the slow revealing of a dead woman caught up in a bunch of bushes, before progressing on to the main stories.The first half of the film sets up each of the dozen or so main characters: the apparent protagonist is detective Leon (Anthony LaPaglia). Although he's married to Sonja (Kerry Armstrong), he has an affair with Jane (Rachael Blake), who's currently separated from her own husband Peter (Glenn Robbins). Sonja suspects Leon's affair and confides in renowned therapist Valerie Somers (Barbara Hershey). Valerie is herself having a personal crisis or two, dealing with her emotionally distant husband John (Geoffrey Rush) and the unnerving revelations of one client, a gay man named Patrick (Peter Phelps). There are more sub-plots and characters that interweave in the lives of these characters on the edge, but those are the ones that truly drive the film.The second half of the film begins when it's revealed that Valerie has disappeared. Since several characters have some connection to her, it ramps up the tension between each character to breaking point.Handling a movie with multiple sub-plots is always difficult. You only ever hear about it if the makers get it absolutely right. Lantana managed to get it right, juggling each sub-plot smoothly. The film lasts for about two hours (roughly an hour less than films of a similar breed like Magnolia or Short Cuts) and it does not drag at all. It even feature a couple of mysteries outside of the main "disappearance" arc (the most obvious ones including "Who has Patrick been sleeping with?" and "What does Sonja say at the end of the therapy session?") Visually speaking, the film is brilliant. The quality see-saws from grainy to polished in such a manner that it works. The acting (comprised of several well-known Australian actors, including a surprisingly serious turn by Robbins) is top-notch. Some moments may be over-the-top, but overall it's done well and with considerable restraint. I don't remember being too impressed with the score, but I'd figure that if it was good I'd remember it.Lantana may not be the most original of films. As I outlined earlier, it's very similar to Short Cuts and Magnolia in terms of narrative, and the strength of the disappearance mystery may seem about as strong to a modern audience as the plot of the average CSI episode. However, as a whole the film works out fine. It proves to be a complex, thought-provoking meditation on the lives of overly human people that aren't necessarily bad, but just struggle to try and stay good even in the face of such extreme adversity.