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Oscar And Lucinda

1997, Movie, R, 120 mins

Oscar And Lucinda: Review

OSCAR AND LUCINDA
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A chastely passionate romance between a gangly minister and a strong-willed heiress played out against the backdrop of the 19th-century Australian Outback... are we in bodice-ripping territory here? The answer is firmly no: Adapted from the Booker Prize-winning novel by Peter Carey, this off-kilter epic revolves around the near-romance of Oscar Hopkins (Ralph Fiennes) and Lucinda Leplastrier (Cate Blanchett), but takes eccentric detours into gambling addiction, the genocidal displacement of Australian aborigines by European settlers and the arcane world of glass production. The son of a Protestant minister (Clive Russell) so doctrinaire that his followers consider the celebration of Christmas a popish blasphemy, young Oscar scandalizes his father by adopting the Anglican faith. As a young man, the physically awkward, socially unschooled Oscar discovers a gift for gambling that marks him further as an outcast and a sinner, even though he gives his winnings to the poor. Bloomer-clad Lucinda, meanwhile, is a feminist before her time: Intelligent, impetuous and fiercely independent, she uses her substantial inheritance to buy a glass factory and throws herself into the minutia of the business, assuaging the loneliness her headstrong nature brings by playing cards and dice. Gambling brings Oscar and Lucinda together, but their relationship is cemented by a mad plan to build a glass church and deliver it to the godforsaken Outback town of Bellingen. Richly imagined and resolutely unpredictable, this dark and profoundly optimistic paean to passion -- for glass, for horses, for the thrill of the moment after a coin is flipped but before it falls -- is held together by Gillian Armstrong's solid direction and by strong, if occasionally strident, performances from Fiennes and newcomer Blanchett. leave a comment --Maitland McDonagh
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