Purple Noon (1960)
Directed by René Clément
Tom Ripley is a talented mimic, moocher, forger and all-around criminal improviser; but there's more to Tom Ripley than even he can guess.
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What critics compared Purple Noon to
Deep Water is based on the 1957 novel by Patricia Highsmith, whose work has inspired an entire shelf of classic films, including Strangers on a Train , The Talented Mr. Ripley , The American Friend , Purple Noon , Carol , and others.
Mr. Minghella, who also wrote the script, aptly captures the spooky mood of Patricia Highsmith�s truly frightening novel, which was also the basis of Rene Clement�s 1960 thriller Purple Noon with Alain Delon.
However, I can say for sure that renting North By Northwest (or the The Talented Mr. Ripley's original incarnation, Rene Clement's Purple Noon) would be much more satisfying.
Minghella jettisons the thrilling narcissism in Rene Clement's 1960 version of "Ripley," "Purple Noon," in which Alain Delon was forced to be luxuriously obsessed with himself.
Filmed before in 1960 as France's Purple Noon, this newer version tells the story of Tom Ripley (Matt Damon), a kid of lower standing who, through unusual circumstances, finds himself hanging out in Italy with a wealthy American slacker (Jude Law) and the latter's big-hearted girlfriend (Gwyneth Paltrow).
Rene Clement filmed Highsmith's novel in 1960 as Purple Noon; that version was more conventional and derivative of Hitchcock, but at least it didn't inflate the story, as Minghella does, to the proportions of Ben-Hur.
At one point, he and his little buddies even get into a tussle with some oars while in a rowboat, the film briefly threatening to become Purple Noon.
But Harron also has murder-minded movies like "Purple Noon," "Peeping Tom" and "Taxi Driver" on her mind.
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Phyllis Nagy, a friend of Highsmith’s, worked on the screenplay for 15 years and, although she can’t say with certainty that the author would have approved of the cinematic version, she believes Highsmith would have been more pleased with this adaptation than several earlier screen interpretations of her work (Strangers on a Train and Purple Noon in particular).