The English Patient (Anthony Minghella, 1996)

The English Patient feels alternately bloated and rushed. I'm still not certain what motivates Hana (Juliette Binoche) to hunker down in a war-ravaged monastery with her "English patient" Almásy (Ralph Fiennes) beyond a mere narrative contrivance, i.e., the ploy allows Almásy to convey his story. But then why give her a romance with sexy Kip (Naveen Andrews) 90 minutes into the film? Their scenes feel clipped and unsatisfying, needlessly expanding the running time to 162 damn minutes.

And then there's the pernicious fundamental attribution error that so much popular cinema commits. Katharine (Kristin Scott Thomas) calls for "an Earth without maps" as her dying wish. A beautiful wish (although so much avant-garde art achieves that goal). But immediately before, she intones, "We’re the real countries. Not the boundaries drawn on maps, the names of powerful men." No, in fact, we're the products of particular sociohistorical moments, shaped, if not created, by borders and the psychoses of those in power. To pretend otherwise is to honor a solipsism that renders Almásy's climactic decision (surrendering maps to the Germans in order to save Katharine) a monumental act of self-absorption rather than a heroic feat in the face of inconceivable atrocities. One terrific Hollywood film that does display how government machinations impact our everyday interactions: Ishtar (Elaine May, 1987).

Still, I dug the corny three-day trek through the desert as well as Almásy and Katharine boinking while a party sings "Silent Night" inches away. And I loved when Kip sends Hana up a rope with a flare to look at the paintings on the monastery wall (although couldn't she see them in the daylight?). Finally, gorgeous as Almásy was, I'd rather party with Katharine's husband Geoffrey (Colin Firth), boisterous and fun where Almásy was cranky (and less lustworthy than Julian Wadham's Madox).

Grade: B-minus