MovieChat Forums > Plein soleil (1960) Discussion > Eyes the doorway to the soul?

Eyes the doorway to the soul?

posted 10 years ago by Tin_ear
3 replies | jump to latest

Anyone else (I guess I mean heterosexual men on this one) notice Tom/Alain Delon's peepers? The entire film I kept noticing his weird facial tics, like when he is confronted by Miles in the apartment, or when he winks at the fishmonger. I got the distinct impression that he basically was hollow inside judging by this emphasis on his eyes, a soulless psychopath, unlike the IMDb blurb which indicates there is "more to Tom Ripley than even he can guess." There actually seems to be less. He is nothing more a moocher and petty criminal, and has no ambition to anything higher than that. There isn't any reason to believe he's even capable of love. People look him straight in the eye and are fooled, like he is so vacant that anyone could project anything they wanted upon him. Interestingly enough the only people who seem to intuit this and see him for the void of humanity he is wind up dead. Does anyone know if he depicted the same in the book? Maybe something got lost in translation, I know the climax was altered pretty drastically.

[–] galaxy7 10 years ago

There isn't any reason to believe he's even capable of love. People look him straight in the eye and are fooled, like he is so vacant that anyone could project anything they wanted upon him.Interestingly enough the only people who seem to intuit this and see him for the void of humanity he is wind up dead.

I'm not sure that even those he killed were able to see the "real" Ripley, otherwise they would have avoided him like the plague.

Yes, the character is shockingly cold, as someone has already posted in another thread: "One scene always haunted me. In his apartment in Rome, Ripley finally kills Freddie who's figured out he killed Greenleaf. After murdering a supposed "friend", Ripley sits down at a table with his back to the camera and devours a chicken leg. I felt more evil pouring out of Alain Delon's back in this shot than anything Mr. Damon did in the remake." http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054189/board/thread/7319852?p=3&d=196 718472#196718472

The closest thing to a "feeling" would be if one of his family members or something similar, were endangered by someone else - he would probably react the same way wild animals do when they are defending their packs, instinctively. But, excluding that behaviour (which is not exclusively human) he does not seem capable of having feelings for anyone.
Throughout the movie, he shows a little bit of sympathy towards Marge, I doubt however that was genuine.

[–] vicky_lc2001 (1907) 7 years ago

Very interesting observation.

But you know (I haven't read the book), your description of Delon is basically the description of Delon in most of his films. He is described as an "ice cold angel" or someone so devoid of feeling or emotion underneath his beauty. His beauty is described as 'unnerving', 'cold', 'isolated' or even 'threatening'. And everything you mentioned above is described of him in other films like in The Samurai, Shock Treatment, or The Leopard. That seems to be his forte as an actor, or 'trademark' of sorts, intense like Pacino and De Niro but 'sociopathic' somehow.

[–] Otter (24464) 6 years ago

If Matt Damon had been able to deliver even a shred of what Alain Delon gave the role, "The Talented Mr. Ripley" might have been a great film rather than a good one.