The Truth About Charlie By Peter Tonguette Peter Tonguette was Staff Critic for The Film Journal from 2002 to 2005.  His writing has also appeared in Senses of Cinema, Bright Lights Film Journal, Contracampo, and 24fps Magazine.

The question most moviegoers will probably bring with them to Jonathan Demme's The Truth About Charlie is what on earth compelled Demme, the Oscar-winning director of Handle With Care, Something Wild and The Silence of the Lambs, to remake Charade. But the reason to ask this question is not because Charade is a cinematic masterpiece; Stanley Donen's 1963 film is a well made diversion, not as good as Donen at his finest (Singin' in the Rain, Two for the Road) though many leagues better than Donen at his worst (Lucky Lady, Saturn 3). No, the real motivation to ask this question comes from viewing the film itself. In Charade, Donen managed a balancing act consisting of suspense, romance, and light comedy-- a formula that has been compared to the Hitchcock of North by Northwest. But Demme here only seems really engaged by the romance and the comedy. His attitude towards the actual plot seems relaxed at best and more frequently offhandedly dismissive. In the end one feels that the director would have been better off finding an outlet for his enthusiasms--namely, an ethnically diverse contemporary Paris, light comic romance, and star Thandie Newton--in another project.

The story in both Charade and Charlie involves recently widowed Regina Lambert (Newton) and her collision with suspicious, omnipresent Joshua Peters (Mark Whalberg), who together search for "the truth" about her late husband's death. Complications arise in the form of persistent French detectives, a questionable American official (Tim Robbins), and a sum of $6 million which has gone missing since the death of Mr. Lambert.

The Truth About Charlie reaches an impasse whenever there's too much plot or background story and Demme seems relatively disinterested in the film's numerous and tiring action sequences. But the film has an unforced charm in the scenic and well-used Paris locales, the amusing allusions to the French New Wave (Truffaut's Shoot the Piano Player is glimpsed in a scene, as is the indelible Anna Karina), and the quieter moments between Newton and Whalberg. Newton is not only stunning to look at, but unusually adept at tuning into this film's signal and running with it. Superb in many films from Bertolucci's Besieged to Demme's own Beloved, here all that is asked of her is to be a movie star for a few hours and she pulls the role off with a beguiled grace that calls to mind Hepburn herself.

                                                                 © FILM JOURNAL 2002