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Snow Falling On Cedars
1999
Australian director Scott Hicks's Snow Falling on Cedars is far removed from the character-driven, pure storytelling of his previous movie, Shine, and a comparative plunge into moody atmospherics. Action insinuates itself through the director's determined eye for watercolour composition and free-floating perspective, like .. Read more
| Starring | Ethan Hawke, Youki Kudoh, Rick Yune, James Rebhorn |
|---|---|
| Director | Scott Hicks |
| Genres | Drama |
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Snow Falling On Cedars
Australian director Scott Hicks's Snow Falling on Cedars is far removed from the character-driven, pure storytelling of his previous movie, Shine, and a comparative plunge into moody atmospherics. Action insinuates itself through the director's determined eye for watercolour composition and free-floating perspective, like random shoots of new growth in an overwhelming rain forest. It's impossible to be complacent as a viewer because Hicks's meditative style paradoxically forces one to locate and make the story happen internally. The approach makes good aesthetic sense in that the story, based on David Guterson's bestselling novel, couches courtroom drama in dreamy textures, and Hicks is determined to reflect that even if it means turning an audience's idea of narrative on its head.
The director gets a lot of help from the weather in the Pacific Northwest: the setting is one of Washington State's San Juan Islands, where rain embraces earth and sky in a singular, introverted personality. There, a Japanese American war hero (Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa) stands accused of murdering a white fisherman in the years following World War II. His wife (Youki Kudoh) is the former childhood sweetheart and lover of a local newspaperman (Ethan Hawke) whose bitterness over the loss--as well as his helplessness during the internment of Japanese Americans, and the crusading legacy of his journalist father (Sam Shepard)--prevents him from coming to the defence of the accused man. Layered emotions, layered sensations, layered clouds. This is historical fiction of a sort that works best as an experience of time's relativity: flowing, stopping, trickling. Ironically, the film's most commercial element, the trial, is the least interesting aspect, though old pro Max Von Sydow makes those scenes great fun as a wily defence counsel. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com
| Starring | Ethan Hawke, Youki Kudoh, Rick Yune, James Rebhorn, James Cromwell, Eric Thal, Celia Weston |
|---|---|
| Director | Scott Hicks |
| Studio | UNIVERSAL PICTURES UK |
| Run time | DVD: 2 hrs 8 mins |
| Certificate | |
| Genres | Drama |
| Language | DVD: English |
| Dubbed | German |
| Subtitles | DVD: Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, German, Greek, Hebrew, Norwegian, Polish, Swedish |
| Released | DVD: 21 Jul 2003 Production year: 1999 |
| Format | DVD |
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Critics' reviews (6)
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It's rare to experience an adaptation of a novel as true to the spirit of the original as director Scott Hicks's follow-up to the Oscar-winning Shine. David Guterson's book is vivid, poetic and sensual, qualities this film, about prejudice within a small fishing community in the years following the Second World War, shares in abundance. Ethan Hawke plays a local journalist fascinated by the trial of a Japanese-American war hero accused of murdering a fellow fisherman. The trial becomes the focus for fear and scapegoating in a mixed-race community torn apart by Pearl Harbor. Hicks sacrifices narrative thrust for atmosphere, resulting in a slow but very special and beautiful film.
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A slow-moving drama of smalltown racial prejudice that lingers on landscapes as much as on the individuals caught up in a courtroom drama of a familiar kind.
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Most helpful member's review
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4 out of 4 people found this review helpful
Books v. Films
It is always disappointing when you read a book and the film does not come even close to the book. That is not the case in respect of this film, which really captures the weather, the atmosphere, the personal torment of the individuals. I learnt a lot from the book about the treatment of the Japanese by the Americans during and after the war. It is important that this is put in the public arena which this film and book does well.
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Most recent members' review
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1 out of 1 person found this review helpful
This is an engrossing, although not always enjoyble film. It deals with the imprisonment of Japanese in the US during WWII, and the subsequent trial of a Japanese man for murder. The flashbacks to the main character's childhood are touching, but the fact that he's hiding evidence that could free his first love's husband is not dealt with adequately - you're left feeling intrigued but wanting more.
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News and features
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No Reservations
- 23 Aug 2007
If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the cinema! Kitchen movies are quite the fad right now, what with Waitress on release, and Pixar's Ratatouille at your local car boot(-leg) sale. A remake of the well-liked German film Mostly Martha, No Reservations is a polished, upscale Hollywood romance. The menu may be somewhat predictable, but the presentation is clean, the flavours are simple but sweet, and it has a nice, light texture. Catherine Zeta Jones is Kate, chef at 22 Bleeker Street, a... Read more
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Australian director Scott Hicks's Snow Falling on Cedars is far removed from the character-driven, pure storytelling of his previous movie, Shine, and a comparative plunge into moody ... -