Nobel-winning Australian author Patrick White’s lengthy 1973 novel sees wealthy matriarch Elizabeth Hunter (Charlotte Rampling) on her deathbed. Her children, socialite Dorothy (Davis) and famous but struggling actor Basil (Geofferey Rush), fly across the world to see her – and to settle the matter of their inheritance.
Adapting a celebrated novel for the screen can’t be easy. When filmmakers take an overly literal approach, as John Hillcoat did with The Road (2009), the transition from page to film feels unwarranted. On the other hand, when Howard Hawks and his team on To Have and Have Not (1944) boldly discarded the essence of Hemingway’s source material, the resulting masterpiece resembled the book in name only, and might as well not have been an adaptation at all.
With The Eye of the Storm (2011), screenwriter Judy Morris and director Fred Schepisi aim for a middle ground, retaining the book’s basic narrative but economising. White’s novel is celebrated for its complexity; the vastness of its scope; the diversity of its characters, viewpoints, and language. What the film provides is relatively straightforward melodrama, jazzed up with a few flashbacks, some abrupt scene changes and a dizzying overabundance of cuts.
Though it struggles to find a cinematic language that locates the epic in the everyday, becoming distractingly restless at times, it’s saved by a welcome streak of cynical humour. See it for a trio of excellent performances: Rampling, Rush and Davis are all as impressive as ever.
Overall Verdict: Thanks to high-calibre acting, a very watchable stab at adapting a classic novel for the screen.
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Reviewer: Tom René