I had no idea what to expect, because I had seen Jules Dassin do everything from light comedy to hard noir to fatalistic heist to screwball caper, but I had no idea how he would handle a classical tragedy. The answer was, really well. I was so happy.
The film really knows its ritual gestures. At the launching of the SS Phaedra, Thanos produces a priceless ring: I realized I was waiting for him to throw it into the sea like Asterion and Theseus in The King Must Die. He presents it to Phaedra instead: places it on her finger as if this ceremony were a second wedding. She wears it to London to meet Alexis; it's on her finger as she talks of the sacrifices the ancient Greeks would pledge for things they really wanted. Her example is pig sacrifice—associated with the goddess Demeter. But she has no pig, she mourns. She draws the ring off her finger; shows it to Alexis so that the stone catches the glitter of streetlights. Without taking her eyes from her stepson's, she says, very low and deliberately, "I wish that you come to Greece." And she throws the ring into the Thames. Damn, Dassin and Lymberaki. Damn.
no subject
I had no idea what to expect, because I had seen Jules Dassin do everything from light comedy to hard noir to fatalistic heist to screwball caper, but I had no idea how he would handle a classical tragedy. The answer was, really well. I was so happy.
The film really knows its ritual gestures. At the launching of the SS Phaedra, Thanos produces a priceless ring: I realized I was waiting for him to throw it into the sea like Asterion and Theseus in The King Must Die. He presents it to Phaedra instead: places it on her finger as if this ceremony were a second wedding. She wears it to London to meet Alexis; it's on her finger as she talks of the sacrifices the ancient Greeks would pledge for things they really wanted. Her example is pig sacrifice—associated with the goddess Demeter. But she has no pig, she mourns. She draws the ring off her finger; shows it to Alexis so that the stone catches the glitter of streetlights. Without taking her eyes from her stepson's, she says, very low and deliberately, "I wish that you come to Greece." And she throws the ring into the Thames. Damn, Dassin and Lymberaki. Damn.