Director Philip Philip Kaufman, born in Chicago in 1936, studied at the University of Chicago and Harvard Law School. A great film director and screenwriter, if nothing else, just watch the three erotic classics he made. In 1988, Milan? Kundera's "The Unbearable Lightness of Life" was brought to the screen in 1990, based on part of Anais Nin's shocking diary A Journal of Love. This "Henry and Joan" in 2000 featured French erotica writer Sa De's experience in the second half of his life was made into "Quil". He has a high literary accomplishment and has a soft spot for writers' films. A film about Hemingway's romance will also be shot by him, which is worth looking forward to.
Thanks to his films, Americans feel they finally have an erotic canon that rivals Europe. Maybe American porn before was just vulgar, sensual, naked and visually disgusting. Philip Kaufman makes erotic desire ambiguous, confusing and romantic, with intellectual intoxication and spiritual enjoyment. He is indeed a master who can make eroticism feel innocent.
Anais Nin is played by Portuguese actor Maria de Medeiro, who, like Anais Nin, is also the daughter of a pianist. Her performance in this film is very good, with black hair, a pair of willful and inquiring emptiness and big eyes, clear and bright, she shows a woman who is eager for more sexual experience and has a hot and floating heart, showing a sense of innocence. She and June's Uma Thurman also collaborated on Pulp Fiction in 1994. A woman with this kind of appearance can't stand old. It's a bit unbearable to see her now, but 20 years ago, it made people feel like an angel. Like we see Zhou Xun. Her bourgeois demeanor in the film complements June's bohemian vibe.
Henry Miller, played by Fred Ward, does an excellent job of a cynic, never respectful of women, a down-and-out middle-aged "rogue" writer. His mouth crooked, with a wicked smile. He's a penniless guy who likes street life, what else can he be afraid of? He is not afraid of losing anything, so he was able to write "The Tropic of Cancer", which is "indecent". Especially in the last scene, the two women left, both heartbroken. He was slightly lost, and continued to be cynical and play with life. Such a person's physical strength, vitality, and heart are so tenacious, how can a woman take him? Henry Miller only died when he was nearly ninety years old.
June's Uma Thurman, who is 19 years old in this film, is radiant. She doesn't make many appearances in the film, but every time she comes out, it makes others eclipsed. She deduces the beauty of Miller, the second wife, which is unpredictable, unreasonable, worldly and refined. Such a taxi dancer, a stripper, and bisexual, actually thinks her husband can become Dostoevsky, has seen all the troubles, but is so proud and innocent. As she said in the movie: I've done the vilest things, the foulest things, but I've done them superbly. She is a dangerous seductress and a vulnerable woman who knows her husband is No one can stand his betrayal. She inspired Henry Miller's writing talent, it's no wonder that Anais was initially attracted to her. She later appeared several times in the work of both of them.
The film also features Anais' wealthy first husband, Hugo, who was then a financier and artist, tolerant of Anais's odyssey of sexuality, and pretending to be ignorant. Kevin Spacey, who won the Best Actor Oscar for "American Beauty" in 1999, plays Anais' cousin and lover in the film.
The most successful part of the film is that it captures the feel of Paris in the 1930s. It was nominated for the Best Cinematography Oscar in 1991, and the music and the film work perfectly. It was the Paris of the mobile feast, where everyone made art or talked about it, as Hemingway said: If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.
The director had a meeting with Anais Nin in 1962, and maybe that's one of the reasons he made this film.
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