The Winter Guest . Tucson Weekly . 05-11-98

The Winter Guest

DIRECTED BY: Alan Rickman

REVIEWED: 05-11-98

This slow moving film follows four couples through a largely uneventful day in an English coastal town. A mother and her adult daughter walk the icy beaches arguing about everything; two schoolboys smoke cigarettes and play with fire, two elderly women attend a funeral, and a teenage girl taunts and then falls in love with a teenage boy. Mostly, the appeal of this film is in its cinematography. Lensman Seamus McGarvey has a sense of composition that could only be compared to John Toland's. Each shot has the balance and sensitivity of an Ansel Adams photograph, with objects interacting by virtue of shape and position to produce pleasing geometries. Unfortunately, the interactions of the characters are often much less interesting, though the story of the teenagers finding love is compelling--if frustratingly limited and interrupted by the other three scenarios.

--James DiGiovanna

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The Winter Guest
The Winter Guest

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The Winter Guest

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