Practically spilling over from my last topic, I finished watching Elegy, the 2008 film starring Ben Kingsley and Penelope Cruz. The film is remarkable in its probing examination of the appearance of things. Kingsley plays David, an aging professor who decides to woo his much younger student, Consuela, played by a mystifying Penelope Cruz. The film studies the characters as if they were shells of people. The captivating part of this film is how it attempts to reveal the unexpected insides of these shells.
David tells Consuela that she is a work of art and while Penelope Cruz sure is a looker…it makes one wonder about (again) what defines art? He undermines her by seeing her as a piece of artwork…objectifying her very being. The character of David himself is intriguing in that his exterior completely contradicts his interior. He feels young. Yet that inner youth is tainted by the reality of his aging body. He fights to find life. Consuela remains a mystery to him…a beautiful shield concealing the warrior.
The film is fleshed out with several decent supporting performances. Peter Sarsgaard is passable as David’s finicky son. Dennis Hopper is deliciously blunt as David’s womanizing poet friend. The true standout of the supporting cast is definitely Patricia Clarkson. Her performance as Carolyn is brilliantly nuanced and assured. The character is endlessly fascinating thanks to Clarkson’s realistic filling out of the “shell” of a life that Carolyn leads. She’s unorthodox in her relationship with David, but she seems to find a bizarre strength in the dissention from society’s norms.
As the film progresses, however, the veneers of these people’s lives begin to crack and reveal the solitude that they endure. They all feel trapped into these molds they’ve made for themselves. Alone for life. David fights to recapture his youth, a youth he threw away to endless hordes of women in bed. Consuela fights against the sickness that pervades her very beauty, a beauty she grows to resent. The film is full of little truths regarding life. The two lead performances are stunning. Cruz is a marvel and creates such a tragic character beneath the surface of her glossy appearance. I enjoyed the film to pieces.
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