The Name of the Rose (or: Christian Slater Looks Like This Throughout)

I can't read Umberto Eco. I am lured in, curiosity piqued by the volume of his research and preparation, but once I realize, a few hundred pages in, that he will never actually take an interest in his characters, I parole myself from the book. Characters are the only reason why a story may be interesting to me. Plot can only be effective to serve a story that is really about characters. This is why I dislike mysteries, most of the time. I particularly dislike the phrase "whodunit," because there is no reason to act like you can't speak properly.

Even if Eco didn't breathe much life into these characters, the film version shows that at least a really great cast can do it. When I write "great cast," I don't mean they're all big names or even particularly gifted actors. They're just amazing to watch because they're all so physically startling. Apart from the two familiar principals Connery and Slater, every face in the cast is singular and grotesque, and I loved looking at the bunch of them crowded together. The atmosphere and design are also, joyfully, perfect. So as an escape to a different reality, it truly succeeds.

Yet it reaches nowhere beyond that. Eco said he suspected the director Jean-Jacques Annaud wasn't making a Hollywood version of his book. It may not be off the Hollywood assembly line, but by the end, it has indulged in its own set of evasions and bits of melodrama, including one particularly unnecessary crowd-pleasing bit of violence (involving F. Murray Abraham). Yeah, I liked that part too, but it would have been more at home in, say, a Child's Play or a Maniac Cop. The book and film are both frustrating: both have impressive openings that hint at greatness, but it never quite happens.

I must add: Ron Perlman is so much like Tom Waits in this movie that you have to suspect Perlman was called at the last minute to replace him, after he went missing because he... (fill in a story about Tom Waits going on an adventure; include at least 2 of the following: a) a Filipino floor show, b) a Caribbean-Chinese loan shark, c) a blind dog companion, d) an empty fifth of Ballantine's in a snowy wheat field, e) a rusting pile of tools.)