After the beautiful, tear-jerking The Hours I was really looking forward to sitting back and letting another Julianne Moore film take over my tear ducts. What a disappointment, though! Not that it was Julianne’s fault, she was pretty good (although, like all the actors in this film, a little over-done), nope, I blame the director Todd Haynes.

Moore plays Cathy Whitaker, a ‘perfect’ mother and wife in 1950′s Connecticut. She is always friendly and polite (‘even to negroes’, which is somewhat shocking to her white middle-class friends) and endlessly patient with her rather gruff and frustrated husband Frank (Dennis Quaid). He is the first problem for me in this film. His character gives you no reason to feel any sympathy for him as he struggles with his sexual attraction to other men. That is partly Quaid’s fault for not being able to act, but also the director’s fault for not showing a more sympathetic side to Frank. His wife is so polite (and emotionally constipated) that when she succumbs to tears at one stage, Moore’s performance is superb as she sobs, gulping and whispering, “I’m fine, I’m fine” and makes you want to scream to make her scream to release the tension that must be killing her inside. Consequently the film is little over-simplified when it comes to good / bad distribution of characters. Quaid being sympathetic could have made the film more complex and interesting. Now you don’t really give a toss whether he finds happiness or not.

When Cathy befriends the well-educated gardener, Raymond (Dennis Haysbert) her friends are even more shocked and eventually alienate her. Racism is another aspect of this film that I feel Haynes made too black and white (excuse the pun) and over-simplified. The looks that the other women give Cathy when they suspect her of having an affair with Raymond are so overdone and ham-acted it made some people in the cinema laugh which I’m sure wasn’t what Haynes intended. Dennis Haysbert is a redeeming aspect of the film alongside Moore and is rather adorable in the same way that Michael Clarke Duncan was as John Coffey in The Green Mile; a kind, huge man with a very low voice. There didn’t seem to be a single white male in this film that wasn’t an asshole. That’s what I mean with ‘black and white’. Patricia Clarkson plays Cathy’s best friend, Eleanor and does a good job (although nothing beats her performance as Greta in High Art, that was brilliant )

Reading some reviews of this film on imdb I noticed that there are a lot of people that praise the cinematographic beauty of the film whereas I was about to criticize it harshly. I don’t know if it was a projection problem or if it was filmed that way, but the entire film looked rather grainy and almost blurry. Having seen stills on the internet that look exactly the same (see these photos, they are blurrier than photos with other reviews aren’t they?) I conclude that it must be the film. The content of the shots is often beautiful, but you have Connecticut Autumn-reds to thank for that rather than beautifully worked out tracking shots. Am I being unfair now? Sorry

As for the editing; Haynes uses dissolves and fade-to-blacks between almost every scene which makes it feel very old-fashioned and disjointed. If he were to defend himself now by saying that that was intentional, to give it an authentic 1950′s film feel, I’d respond by saying that there are better ways of recreating a 1950′s feel than resorting to 1950′s editing-style. It didn’t work for me.

And finally, add to my list of annoyances the exaggerated 1950′s-speak. I have never heard anyone say “Oh my goodness” as many times as Julianne Moore in such a short space of time. And the kids all say “Aw shucks pop” and “Gee whizz”. American friends, can you tell me if people really spoke like that in the 50′s?!?

Conclusion: Far From Heaven is far from heaven. Pity.

**1/2 out of 5