An heiress accuses a farmhand, whom she has employed to be her escort, of stealing a diamond earring.This film feels like Tennessee Williams's work from beginning to end, and one can almost draw one-to-one parallels from The Loss of the Teardrop Diamond to Cat on the Hot Tin Roof; both films are about maintaining
integrity in a dishonest and disappointing world, but Teardrop is far less subtle, almost banging you on the head with speeches about how one's word is all that one can truly control. These are resonant themes in Williams's work, and the "style." by which I mean the long monologues filled with sharp images and the characters' slow drawl, is also typical Williams. But I can understand why this screenplay was never produced during his lifetime. There are elements that just don't fit, most obviously the Ellen Burstyn character, and when Fisher does what she does with the second medicine bottle, I wondered when she would experience something more than making the scenery look darker.I didn't recognize Bryce Dallas Howard, who gives a fine performance, but Chris Evans is what Chris Evans would be if he routinely talked in a Southern accent. Overall, this is a poor effort, but die-hard fans of Williams will find something to like.
August 6, 2011
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