Act 2 spoilers below. Act 3 is not spoiled, at
least not in that sense of the word. (It is spoiled by its bad writing,
but that's a whole 'nother kettle o' crawdads.)
A Closed Book is essentially a stage play in three acts with two
characters, similar in many ways to Sleuth.
In Act 1 we meet a crotchety old English art critic who has lost his
sight in an accident. The curmugeon hopes to write one more book, an
autobiography, but being blind he needs an amanuensis. As the film begins,
he is interviewing a 40ish woman named Jane for the position. She accepts
the job, which consists of living with him in a massive gothic mansion
(played by Knebworth House)
and typing as he dictates. Things progress in a normal, predictable way
for some thirty minutes, with no indication that the film will be a
thriller or a mystery. This act relies on the verbal interaction between
the characters to grab and hold our attention.
Theoretically.
Things start to get weird in Act 2. As the pair works together in a
late night session, the blind man asks his amanuensis to put another log
on the fire. She responds by feeding the flames with his first edition
Thackeray. She continues to deceive him in various ways. She brings him
the wrong jigsaw puzzle from a museum gift shop. She gives the housekeeper
a week off so that he has no other contact with the outside world, then
she pretends to read him the newspaper, but actually just fabricates
absurd stories - e.g. "Donald Trump has become a Muslim." As the act winds
down, her pranks gradually turn more malicious.
In Act 3, all the mysteries are unveiled and we are finally allowed to
see what is really going on. There is a rapid-fire series of plot twists.
This screenplay was adapted from a highly regarded literary thriller,
but it has to be considered a failure and a disappointment, especially
considering that the author of the eponymous novel, Gilbert Blair, also
authored the screenplay and managed to turn his much-praised book into a
dreary little film.
There is essentially nothing happening in Act 1 except set-up, so the
author needs to catch our attention with an intriguing premise and hold it
with some sharp dialogue. He does neither. The crotchety blind luddite,
played by Tom Conti, is a literary cliché and his genius is never evident
to us. Oh, we are told he is a genius, but that is demonstrated neither by
witty dialogue nor by brilliant excerpts from his inchoate new book, which
actually seems to be nothing more than stuffy posturing. If the alleged
genius is merely lacking in evidence of genius, his secretary seems to be
lacking evidence of a personality. The Act 1 dialogues between the
pontificating bully and the deferential cipher turn out to be predictably
mundane. Their interaction assumes a formulaic rhythm which consists of
his verbal belligerence, followed by her obsequious apologies, followed by
his own guilt-laden excuses for the offense he continually seems to
generate.
Act 2 is the best part of the film because it is largely successful in
maintaining its air of mystery, but even that appropriately enigmatic
atmosphere is marred by some heavy-handed musical cues, and some behavior
which is out of character for the amanuensis. There is an awkward WTF nude
scene, for example, and the fact that the secretary, while subverting some
trivial elements of the author's life, is nonetheless recording his
precious book faithfully! In the novel's version (according to the
reviewers), it was clear that the secretary was feeding the author
misinformation for a purpose, hoping he would incorporate it into his book
and thus destroy his own credibility with claims that seemed like surreal
madness. That makes excellent sense, and is completely in character for
the secretary, but no such indication is given in the film. We see and
hear excerpts from the critic's new book, as does he himself when a local
politician stops by and assists him by reading from his secretary's
computer screen. Everything in the autobiography seems sensible and
consistent with his wishes, albeit tedious.
Act 3 delivers the unraveling, but the secrets are underwhelming and
banal. The build-up of Act 2 leads us to expect something much more
original and delicious in the final stanza, but the actual plot twists
would be obvious except for the fact that they tend to be somewhat
smaller-than-life, or at least less dramatic than we might have expected.
The melodramatic final twist is handled so casually as to seem like an
anticlimactic afterthought. Indeed, perhaps it was an afterthought. I
think the script must have been rewritten many times because the IMDb page
lists a female cast member playing "Jane's successor." Not only did I not
see that actress, but the ultimate resolution of the film, the final twist
which I called an afterthought, precludes the possibility of a successor,
thus indicating that a previous cut of the film must have had a different
ending. (I don't know how the book ends.)
Why does the film adaptation fall so flat? I think some problems must
have been generated by the fact that the male British secretary from the
novel underwent a metamorphosis into a female American for the film, and
that the role was played by Daryl Hannah, whose inner-directed acting
style and limited emotional range frequently made it seem that she wasn't
interacting with the author at all, but just kind of mumbling to herself.
She does two nude scenes, one of them probably body-doubled, but neither
of the scenes seem necessary or even in character. After the curtains have
been pulled back, the full-body nude scene seems to make no sense in
retrospect. (I can't explain more without spoiling the plot.) I don't
suppose the nude scenes would have been there at all if the character had
been a male, as originally written. Those awkward moments seem less like
attempts at character or plot development and more like excuses to show an
attractive naked woman.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
