That heart wrenching closeup. That iconic buzzcut. That performance many think is one of Cate Blanchett’s best. This week Murtada welcomes Kyle Stevens to discuss Heaven (2002), directed by Tom Tykwer.

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What is the film about?

From IMDB: A woman takes the law into her own hands after police ignore her pleas to arrest the man responsible for her husband’s death, and finds herself not only under arrest for murder but falling in love with an officer.

What year did it come out?

October 2002.

Who does Cate play?

Philippa an English teacher living in Turin, Italy who carries out a vengeful act.

How is Cate introduced?

A few minutes in as Phillippa prepares for her quest.

Box Office: Domestic = $784,399 Int’l = $3,462,690

Metacritic : 68 RT: 74

Topics Discussed:

• Conceived as a  new trilogy: Heaven, Purgatory and  Hell from director Krzysztof Kieslowski and his writing partner, Krzysztof Piesiewicz who made Blue, White and Red.
• What could’ve been if Kieslowski didn’t pass on before making it?
• The first few minutes Blanchett body movement looks nothing I’ve ever seen from her. Usually she glides into the frame, here she awkwardly walks, sometimes even waddling. 
• Beautiful visuals… the look is sometimes breathtaking …
• Jarring to native Italian speakers? I trust Cate with accents 
• The plot is facile, easy but is that part of the fable , the unreality of it 
• The ending – did they ascend literally to heaven?
•  Ribisi – yay or nay?
• Revisiting Elizabeth (1998)

Scenes we liked:

• The interrogation scene. Long, fantastic,  The emotions on her face as she realizes the truth. That perfect fall to the floor as she’s overwhelmed… the polar opposite of getting up from the floor on Carol. Yet both show us how remarkable she is at using her to act and give us beautiful images at the same time.
• The confession in the church scene specially her reaction to Ribisi saying “I love you.”

What seemed off:

Did the film successfully mix the grounded visceral elements of its story with the dreamy metaphysical ending?

Film within context of Cate’s career:

•  From all the early 2000s films she made, this is the only one remembered fondly.

Film within the context of year it’s been released:

• This was a Miramax release in the year of The Hours, Gangs of New York and Chicago – so we assume it got lost in the shuffle.

What reviews said of film / Cate:

“In ”Heaven” the Australian dramatic chameleon Cate Blanchett gives the most compelling screen performance of her career as a principled terrorist whose desperate act of violence tragically backfires, leaving her broken and reeling with despair and self-loathing.

As her character, Philippa, a recently widowed young English teacher living in Turin, Italy, disintegrates, Ms. Blanchett registers a wrenching series of quick emotional changes. Upon learning that her carefully plotted act of vigilantism has resulted in the deaths of innocent people, her defiance gives way in seconds to shock, then to horror, then to self-realization so painful that she doubles up and crumples onto the floor, unconscious.

Although Ms. Blanchett’s face has always registered emotion with a mercurial fluidity, the immediacy of feeling she conveys in ”Heaven” is astonishing. It also allows her to carry off the seemingly impossible feat of making us care passionately about a woman who has committed an unforgivable crime.” – Stephen Holden, NY Times.

“Blanchett’s performance confirms her power once again. She never goes for an effect here, never protects herself, just plays the character straight ahead as a woman forced by grief and rage into a rash action, and then living with the consequences.” – Roger Ebert

Promotional work:

• At the Berlinale 
• More from Berlin
• It gave us this hot androgynous look

 

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