FACING "THE GHOST (WRITER)" OF HIS PAST...

I am not quite sure where this borderline obsession with Roman Polanski stems from. It  wasn’t a “wow” moment for me. Like Kubrick for example. I saw Clockwork Orange and the film shook me up so much that I simply had to watch everything he did. Same with Tarantino. I saw Pulp Fiction – I had to see them all. Not Polanski. Of course his “reputation” usually precedes him. You hear the stories, the arguments back and forth. You decide to watch a film or two he did, just to get a view into the mind of the man. Then another. Then, oh incidentally another seems to come your way. Oh, there’s another Polanski in the bargain baskets – shame to leave it there really… Before you know it, you turn around and you’ve actually watched almost everything he has directed. It’s like that moment you look down at the box of chocolates you had on your lap to find that you’ve actually finished the box without realising it. Or a typical Captain Jack Sparrow “Where has all the rum gone?” moment.  Polanski is a versatile director with a great many talents but I think suspense is very much his forte.  So I honestly think this political thriller plays to his strengths and coupled with some rather brilliant acting from actors like Ewan McGregor and Pierce Brosnan, it makes for the kind of thriller that makes you wave your arms and squeal at the television set at key moments. (Yes, this really happened. The fact that I was alone in the house at the time only adds to the um… Atmosphere…).

Ewan McGregor plays an ordinary ghost writer with an extraordinary assignment. He has been hired to complete the memoirs of a former British Prime Minister Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) after the tragic suicide of the former ghost writer on the job. Mr Lang has retired to the USA and lives on an island with his wife and core staff. The ghost (whose name we never discover, rather poignantly) starts doing a good job on the memoirs, but soon their work is interrupted by Lang getting embroiled in a political scandal. This affair obviously stirs up a lot of emotions and events, from which The Ghost begins to glean, firstly, that his predecessor may not actually have committed suicide. That secondly, he may have discovered something that meant that he now “knew too much” and had to be disposed of. Then, he realises what his predecessor has discovered… The question is can he “survive” the consequences of this discovery?

As I said, one thing Polanski is a master of is racking up the suspense. And his method, I have found, very much lies in his minimalism. You see, there are hints. Subtle hints. But that is just what they are, hints. In some more mainstream films, one has to admit, the “hints” take the form of large neon signs and arrows. No, these are tiny. So in the first instance we are hanging onto the edges of our seats desperately scrutinising the screen trying to figure out where the next tiny clue might be. We know it’s there somewhere we’re just not…quite… And then there is another thing. A lot of Polanski’s films are very much based on dialogue. There is A LOT of talking. And not necessarily much in the way of illustration of what is being said. Now this is a risky method, it has to be said, but as Polanski often works with the best actors around; it almost never blows back into his face. But the result is, of course that not only are we desperately searching for clues, we are hanging on to every word that is being uttered to figure out the next twist. Then we catch something. We follow it through into the next sequences… Oh my God, hang on, NO!! The reason this is so successful is that Polanski’s world is, in its subtleties, very close to the real world. No massive, weird coincidences, no  “neon lights” pointing the way, little clues. And these little clues make us all the more uncomfortable. So no, you will feel no surge of adrenaline or wave of fear. You will, however, have millions of niggling little questions. You will, with a growing sense of dread, piece them together with The Ghost, picking up an answer here and an answer there. And as you go through your discoveries with The Ghost, who at some point becomes your partner in crime (Metaphorically) I defy you not to wave your arms at the television at certain key moments… A truly brilliant watch. Do NOT miss it.