Video: The Talented Mr Ripley / Dogma

The Talented Mr Ripley

Herald rating: * * * *

Running time: 140 mins

Rental: Now

Dogma

Herald rating: * * *

Running time: 125 mins

Rental: Now


Reviews: Ewan McDonald

The suits were going, 'Boys, we were thinking half a mil.' And Ben and I, who weren't sure if we can afford McDonald's tonight, are sitting there like, 'Half a mil? Hmmm ...' "

That's how Matt Damon remembers the studio execs agreeing to buy the idea that he and his boyhood pal, Ben Affleck, had for a movie: the story of an undiscovered genius who mops floors in a university and what happens when his talents are uncovered. The story would become Good Will Hunting and the rest, as they say, is Oscars and box-office receipts.

Damon and Affleck have been friends since they met in their hometown of Boston when they were 8. Twenty-two years later they have made five films together; the latest is one of two Damon videos released this week.

First up is the stylish, lavish and intelligent thriller Ripley, in which Damon dares to play a character that few Hollywood stars would take on for fear of their image: a charming, disarming, thoroughly corrupt monster.

This is Anthony Minghella's take on Patricia Highsmith's first novel about Ripley, published in 1955, a poor man who wants to be rich, an unknown man who wants not to be famous but simply to be someone else. He steals people's identities. (Highsmith is better known as the author of another adaptation, Hitchcock's Strangers On A Train.)

Minghella, The English Patient creator, has Ripley borrowing a Princeton blazer to play the piano at a Manhattan party. A rich couple, the Greenleafs, assume he must have known their son Dickie at Princeton. He agrees.

Dickie (Jude Law) has split for Europe to spend their money. His folks send Ripley to Europe and offer him $1000 to bring their son home. Ripley contrives to bump into Dickie, sunning himself on an Italian beach with Marge Sherwood (Gwyneth Paltrow). Ripley tells Dickie why he's there and becomes part of a scene which includes Freddie Miles (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and rich girl Meredith Logue (Cate Blanchett).

I won't give away the story, except to say that Ripley visits some of Italy's most beautiful scenery which is soon littered with bodies.

Damon is extraordinary: the chameleon changes from grey Ripley to brightly coloured jazz-era socialite and back again throughout. Like the people Ripley meets, the viewer has to keep their wits about them: careful, you may find yourself admiring and rooting for the devil.

Speaking of the devil, Dogma has our boys as fallen angels trying to get back into heaven. The comedy is written, directed and features Kevin Smith, who made Clerks and other indie hits.

Loki (Damon) and Bartleby (Affleck) are cast out of heaven and exiled for all eternity to Wisconsin. They hear about a trendy bishop (George Carlin) who wants to give the Catholic church a new image. He's dedicating a cathedral to Buddy Jesus: anyone entering earns a "get out of jail free" card for their sins and goes to heaven.

Sadly, Metatron (Alan Rickman), an angel who appears in the bedroom of Bethany (Linda Fiorentino), explains that if the angels re-enter heaven, God will be proven fallible — and all existence will end.

Bethany is the last relative of Jesus on Earth and two prophets will appear to her. She must follow them to stop the angels and save the universe.

Mildly funny, but not Damon or Affleck's best work. Especially alongside Ripley.