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Anthony Minghella: English Patient
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As a youngster, Minghella assisted his parents in the operation of their ice cream franchise but harbored dreams of a career as a writer. Despite his family's initial objection, he persevered and attended the University of Hull where he majored in English and drama. Also interested in music, Minghella wrote songs and it was an attempt to create a showcase for some of his ditties that led him to pursue a writing career. At the same time, he began directing for the stage while supporting himself as an academic at his alma mater. With the 1981 success of his play "Whale Music", his career began in earnest with commissions for radio and television plays coming in as supplements to his theatrical ventures. The West End production of his examination of the exploitation of women in Thailand, "Made in Bangkok", brought further notice and a citation for Best Play from the London Critics' Circle.
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Minghella's follow-up, Mr. Wonderful (1993), was his first Hollywood production. A drama starring Matt Dillon, Annabella Sciorra, Mary-Louise Parker, and William Hurt, it proved to be a disappointing experience for its director who became very disillusioned with major-studio filmmaking. Despite this, when he began adapting The English Patient for the screen in 1995, Minghella did so with the intention of making the film in concert with 20th Century Fox, who ended up retracting its involvement five weeks before shooting was to begin. It was only after producer Saul Zaentz persuaded the independent and more artistically adventurous Miramax to finance the film (the studio eventually provided 26 million dollars of the film's 31-million-dollar cost) that The English Patient became a reality.
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Minghella remained on somewhat familiar ground for his follow up, a 1999 adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's ‘The Talented Mr. Ripley’. A lush period thriller set in '50s Italy, it featured cinematography by John Seale, who had earned an Oscar for his work on The English Patient. The film was less successful than his previous offering and engendered much debate amongst critics and the public. Simply put some people think it’s superb and others consider it pretentious rubbish. Oh well you can’t keep everyone happy…
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Comment: It is the hallmark of director Minghella's films that people walk out of the theater divided in their opinions. That was the case with "The English Patient" (remember Elaine of "Seinfeld"? And now, with "Ripley", you have people who relish the film on one hand, and then there are people who just couldn't stand it.
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English Patient