Meewella | Critic

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Tag: Heath Ledger

QuickView: Monster’s Ball (2001)

“A portrait captures a person far better than a photograph. It truly takes a human being to really see a human being.”

Lawrence Musgrove

A richly textured character drama set in the Deep South, Monster’s Ball is unafraid to portray human relationships and bigotry as messy without straightforward labels or easy resolution. Billy Bob Thornton and Halle Berry exude raw emotion as the broken Hank and Leticia, whose relationship is one less of desire than of need, rooted in a shared sense of loneliness, grief and guilt. The two exist largely in parallel, recognising each other’s pain but rarely discussing their pasts in detail. Whilst they are connected by an unlikely coincidence, the script deftly avoids the expected tropes, which provides a more poignant conclusion, albeit one that may leave some viewers frustrated.

8/10

QuickView: Candy (2006)

“When you can stop, you don’t want to. When you want to stop, you can’t.”

Casper

A tragic love story, Candy feels like a more grounded companion piece to Requiem for a Dream. It uses a similar act structure to present a junkie couple’s decline, but without the stylised excess. It ultimately may be less soul-destroying but Heath Ledger and Abbie Cornish provide such good, raw and guileless performances that one aches for them despite the familiar journey.

8/10

"A film is a petrified fountain of thought."

(CC) BY-NC 2003-2023 Priyan Meewella

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