A perfectly retro swimsuit, a sailboat: it doesn’t take much more than that for me to sail towards the murky waters of “Mr. Ripley”, the paper antihero created by Patricia Highsmith.
Tom Ripley is a young orphan man, who lives miserably in the America of the 1950s. Mandated by a rich shipping magnate who asks him to convince his son Dickie to abandon Europe to return to the US, here he is on the Italian coast with this spoiled child who lives the dolce vita too fully in the company of his girlfriend Marge.
The psychological issues quickly become intense. Ripley, who grows dependent on Dickie, struggles to conceal his envious nature, while the condescending Dickie uses and abuses his easy-going charm and easy-flowing money.
The situation quickly becomes suffocating and the tension is palpable: Marge dislikes the constant presence of Ripley, who is obsessed with Dickie, although Dickie begins to lose interest in his new friend, treated like a toy.
Death, there will obviously be.
I hesitated for a long time to talk here about the work of Patricia Highsmith because the relationship between this author-mother and this paper child, deployed over five novels, has something visceral and fascinating, but I finally decided to mention two movie adaptations of the first volume of the book series dedicated to “Mr. Ripley” for their different, yet equally stunning visual aesthetic.
The first film is “Purple Noon”, shot in 1960 by René Clément, in which the beauty of Alain Delon, both so luminous and so dark, dialogues perfectly with the incandescent atmosphere which surrounds the characters.
Aboard the beautiful sailboat on which Dickie (who has been renamed “Philippe” for a French audience, interpreted by Maurice Ronet), Marge (Marie Laforêt) and Riley (Alain Delon) embark on a cruise, the unhealthy game of cat and mouse between the two men soon intensifies to end in a disastrous way.
And as if to magnify the feelings of each of the protagonists, in “Purple Noon” the colors are intense and the sun is overwhelming.
Alain Delon, who plays Ripley, has a devilish beauty. He perfectly embodies this antihero, this caged beast whose hunger, psychopathy and inner tension suggest the worst.
There is hardly any question of a psychological explanation – the emphasis being placed by the movie director on the virile confrontation between Philippe and Ripley. The homoerotic subtext of Patricia Highsmith’s novel does not exist in the film which focuses on the fight between two men who each want to establish their dominance.
In addition, with a very last minute twist, the ending of “Purple Noon” differs significantly from that of the novel.
The second film adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s novel is “The Talented Mr. Ripley”, shot in 1999 by Anthony Minghella. The colors are certainly softer, the retro rendering is a pictorial marvel but the plot inevitably pushes the characters towards drama.
So here is my evocation of “Mr. Ripley”. But please rest assured that no photographer was killed during this photo shoot.
August 29, 2019
Anna Sui retro swimsuit – Miu Miu sunglasses – Galeries Lafayette scarf
