The English Patient

The English Patient Information

The English Patient is a 1996 romantic drama film based on the novel of the same name by Sri Lankan-Canadian writer Michael Ondaatje. The film, written for the screen and directed by Anthony Minghella, won nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture. Ondaatje worked closely with the filmmakers.

Set before and during World War II, The English Patient is a story of love, fate, misunderstanding and healing. Told in a series of flashbacks, the film can best be explained by unwinding it into its two chronological phases.

Plot

The film is set during World War II and depicts a critically burned man, at first known only as "the English patient," who is being looked after by Hana, a French-Canadian nurse in an abandoned Italian monastery. The patient is reluctant to disclose any personal information but through a series of flashbacks, viewers are allowed into his past. It is slowly revealed that he is in fact a Hungarian cartographer, Count László de Almásy, who was making a map of the Sahara Desert, and whose affair with a married woman, Katharine Clifton, ultimately brought about his present situation. As the patient remembers more, David Caravaggio, a Canadian intelligence operative and former thief, arrives at the monastery. Caravaggio lost his thumbs while being interrogated by a German army officer, and he gradually reveals that it was the patient's actions that had brought about his torture. In addition to the patient's story, the film devotes time to Hana and her romance with Kip, an Indian Sikh sapper in the British Army. Due to various events in her past, Hana believes that anyone who comes close to her is likely to die, and Kip's position as a bomb defuser makes their romance full of tension.

In the first phase, set in the late 1930s, the minor Hungarian noble Count Laszlo de Almásy (Fiennes) is co-leader of a Royal Geographical Society archeological and surveying expedition in Egypt and Libya. He and his English partner Madox are at heart academics with limited sophistication in the swirling politics of Europe and North Africa. Shortly after the film begins, both the morale and finances of their expedition are bolstered by a British couple, Geoffrey and Katherine Clifton that joins the exploration party. The Count is taken with the gorgeous and refined Katherine. When Geoffrey is often away from the group on other matters, an affair takes wing. The final months before the war's onset bring an archeological triumph: the Count's discovery of an ancient Saharan cave decorated with "swimming figure" paintings dating from prehistoric times, the "Cave of Swimmers". This period also sees the romance between Katherine and the Count rise to a sensuous peak and then seemingly fade. Katherine is plagued with the guilt of infidelity, while the Count shows a streak of jealousy along with an imbalance that will later haunt him.

The fall of 1939 and the war bring all excavation at the cave to a halt, and Madox and the Count go their separate ways. Geoffrey Clifton meanwhile has pieced together the outline of the affair, and seeks a sudden and dramatic revenge: crashing his plane, with Katherine aboard, into the Count's desert camp. The wreck kills Geoffrey instantly, seriously injures Katherine, and narrowly misses the Count. He manages to take Katherine into the relative shelter of the swimming figure cave, leaves her with food, water, a flashlight, and a fire, then begins his scorching three day walk back to the nearest town and help. The town is held by the British Army, and the dazed and dehydrated Count, with his non-English name, is unable to coherently explain to officials the plane crash and Katherine's plight. Instead he loses his temper during questioning and is thrown into military jail. He is sent in chains on a train "north to Benghazi", escapes, finds himself behind Afrika Korps lines and quickly trades his desert maps with the Germans for petrol for Madox's biplane, a De Havilland Tiger Moth, which he had left behind at the close of their archaeological expedition. By the time he returns to the cave, Katherine is dead " and in all but a physical sense, so is the Count. He manages to bundle Katherine's body into the plane and takes off. Mistaking the Tiger Moth for an RAF reconnaissance aircraft, a German anti-aircraft battery shoots down the plane as Almásy pilots it over the desert. Horribly burned but alive, he is rescued by Bedouin tribesmen.

The film's second phase shifts to Italy and the last months of the war. The Count by now is an invalid patient, and wholly dependent by this time on morphine and the care of his French-Canadian nurse Hana, detached from her medical unit and established in a battered but beautiful Italian monastery. That place becomes the focal point for more plot threads, some new and some unfinished from the North African phase, all themed around love, chance, and the backdrop of the war. Hana has seen a fiancé and a nursing friend die in the Italian campaign, and is left to wonder if her involvement with a British-Indian lieutenant will break her cycle of love and grief or simply continue it. A visitor to the villa named Caravaggio is in search for the disfigured Count that he believes played a role in his own ill-starred time in Egypt and Libya. For Caravaggio unwittingly stumbled into the wreckage of the Count-Katherine-Geoffrey love triangle, c. 1940"1942. He's lost both thumbs in a grisly interrogation at the hands of the Nazis, and has since hunted down and killed those he believes responsible for his fate. He believes the Count was part of a web of desert spying and intrigue, and knows that he traded maps with the Germans. He confronts him with news of Madox's suicide, and posits that the Count killed the Cliftons. Only a full recounting at the villa of the Cliftons' crash and the Count's map dealings with the Germans to recover Katherine bring Caravaggio to understanding and forgiveness.

Hana, too, finds reconciliation at the film's end. Her lieutenant survives a brush with death on the war's last day and her hope in love is rekindled. The Count asks for, and dies of, an overdose of morphine from Hana.

Cast

Ralph Fiennes as Count László Almásy
Kristin Scott Thomas as Katharine Clifton
Willem Dafoe as David Caravaggio
Juliette Binoche as Hana
Naveen Andrews as Kip
Colin Firth as Geoffrey Clifton
Julian Wadham as Madox
Jürgen Prochnow as Major Muller
Kevin Whately as Sgt. Hardy
Clive Merrison as Fenelon-Barnes
Nino Castelnuovo as D'Agostino
Hichem Rostom as Fouad
Peter Rühring as Bermann
Geordie Johnson as Oliver
Torri Higginson as Mary
Liisa Repo-Martell as Jan
Raymond Coulthard as Rupert Douglas
Philip Whitchurch as Corporal Dade
Lee Ross as Spalding
Anthony Smee as Beach interrogation officer
Matthew Ferguson as Young Canadian soldier
Jason Done as Kiss Me soldier
Roger Morlidge as Sergeant " Desert Train

Themes

Archaeology

Hungarian noble Count Laszlo de Almásy is co-leader of a Royal Geographical Society archeological and survey expedition in Egypt and Libya. His appearance is commonly linked to Indiana Jones, with the tanned skin, khaki attire and similar hat. Male archaeologists portrayed in films fit one of the numerous stereotypes.

The archaeological discovery of an ancient Saharan cave with "swimming figures" paintings dating from prehistoric times, the "Cave of Swimmers". The painted caves were discovered by the Hungarian explorer László Almásy in October 1933, during the Frobenius expedition. This cave is portrayed in Michael Ondaatje's Novel 'The English Patient' and the Oscar Academy Award winning film. Discovery of the Cave of Swimmers

Archaeology was becoming prevalent during World War 2, especially in Egypt. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, an entire compound of royal graves were discovered whole and preserved at Tanis. Riches, such as gold masks, silver coffins and remarkable jewelry were found. The treasures are one of the greatest archaeological findings of all time.

Production

In his book The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film (2002) Michael Ondaatje records his conversations with the film's editor and sound designer Walter Murch, who won two Academy Awards for the film. Murch describes the complexity of editing a film with multiple flashbacks and timeframes; he edited and reedited numerous times and notes that the final film features over 40 time transitions.

The film was shot on location in Tunisia and Italy.

Reception

The film received widespread critical acclaim and was a major award winner as well as a box office success; its awards included the Academy Award for Best Picture, the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Drama and the BAFTA Award for Best Film. Juliette Binoche won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, winning out over Lauren Bacall for The Mirror Has Two Faces (it would have been Bacall's only Oscar win, and in her acceptance speech Binoche commented that she had expected Bacall to win). Anthony Minghella took home the Oscar for Best Director. Kristin Scott Thomas and Ralph Fiennes were nominated for Best Actress and Best Actor. Overall, The English Patient was nominated for 12 awards and ultimately walked away with 9. Its presence at the Oscars was so large that upon winning Best Original Song for Evita, Andrew Lloyd Webber joked "Thank goodness there wasn't a song in The English Patient." It is the highest-grossing non-IMAX film (and second highest-grossing film overall) to never reach the weekend box office top 5.

The English Patient is one of only three Best Picture winners (Amadeus and The Hurt Locker being the other two) to never enter the weekend box office top 5 since top 10 rankings were first recorded in 1982.

Chicago Sun Times critic Roger Ebert gave the film a 4/4 rating, saying "it's the kind of movie you can see twice " first for the questions, the second time for the answers."

The film has a "Certified Fresh" rating of 83% on Rotten Tomatoes and consensus stating "Though it suffers from excessive length and ambition, director Minghella's adaptation of the Michael Ondaatje novel is complex, powerful, and moving." The film also has a rating of 87% on Metacritic, indicating "universal acclaim".

Awards and honors

69th Academy Awards

Won, Best Picture (Saul Zaentz)
Won, Best Actress in a Supporting Role: Juliette Binoche
Won, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration (Stuart Craig and Stephanie McMillan)
Won, Best Cinematography (John Seale)
Won, Best Costume Design (Ann Roth)
Won, Best Director (Anthony Minghella)
Won, Best Film Editing (Walter Murch)
Won, Best Original Score (Gabriel Yared)
Won, Best Sound (Walter Murch, Mark Berger, David Parker, and Christopher Newman)
Nominated, Best Actor in a Leading Role: Ralph Fiennes
Nominated, Best Actress in a Leading Role: Kristin Scott Thomas
Nominated, Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium (Anthony Minghella)

54th Golden Globe Awards, USA

Won, Best Motion Picture " Drama (Saul Zaentz)
Won, Best Original Score " Motion Picture (Gabriel Yared)
Nominated, Best Director " Motion Picture (Anthony Minghella)
Nominated, Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture " Drama: Ralph Fiennes
Nominated, Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture " Drama: Kristin Scott Thomas
Nominated, Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture: Juliette Binoche
Nominated, Best Screenplay " Motion Picture (Anthony Minghella)

1997 BAFTA Awards, UK

Won, Best Film (Saul Zaentz)
Won, Best Cinematography (John Seale)
Won, Best Editing (Walter Murch)
Won, Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role: Juliette Binoche
Won, Best Screenplay " Adapted (Anthony Minghella)
Won, Best Music (Gabriel Yared)
Nominated, Best Direction (Anthony Minghella)
Nominated, Best Actor in a Leading Role: Ralph Fiennes
Nominated, Best Actress in a Leading Role: Kristin Scott Thomas
Nominated, Best Costume Design (Ann Roth)
Nominated, Best Production Design
Nominated, Best Sound
Nominated, Best Makeup/Hair

1997 Berlin Film Festival

Won, Silver Bear for Best Actress (Juliette Binoche)
Nominated, Golden Bear

American Film Institute Lists

AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies - Nominated Film
AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions - #56
AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores - Nominated Score