The City of Your Final Destination is the first Merchant-Ivory film to be produced after the death of producer Ismail Merchant. As directed by the now 82-year-old James Ivory, City is an actor’s showcase, nominally about a young man attempting to write an authorized biography of a deceased South American writer.

Merchant-Ivory films have always taken a critical shellacking and, admittedly, even their best ones, like A Room With a View and Howards End, are really only good dramas dressed up in period finery. But come on, how many films in 100+ years of film history are considered great art – a few hundred or perhaps a thousand? Isn’t there also room for good drama, acted to the hilt, with great attention paid to production design? I think the answer is an obvious yes, and Merchant-Ivory have provided such warm cocoons more than just a few times; they (or at least James Ivory and his other usual collaborator, writer Ruth Prawer Jhabvala) do once again with City.

A professor of literature at C.U. is attempting to write an authorized biography of the South American writer Julius Gund. He must first obtain permission from Gund’s surviving family, and so he travels to Gund’s South American estate to meet them and get the signatures. This process makes for the bulk of the movie, and much beautifully shot (by Javier Aguirresarobe, who also shot Vicki Cristina Barcelona, with similar blacks and dark earth tones predominating) acting ensues. Anthony Hopkins as Gund’s brother, Laura Linney as his widow, and Charlotte Gainsbourg as his mistress, are all excellent, and obviously really enjoy acting in this small but involving drama.

Gainsbourg, especially, is terrific, in what is a departure for her. Directors have always seemed to equate her epicene looks with a brittle and scornful type of character (brought to full fruition in the not-yet-on-dvd Antichrist). In City, she is anything but this, playing a completely passive woman, who is made more interesting by this characteristic’s duality with the young writer’s passivity, especially when he is being dominated by his harridan of a girlfriend (played to the chilling hilt by Alexandra Maria Lara, of Downfall and Youth Without Youth). Gainsbourg’s character and the young writer are drawn to each other, as often happens when mirrored people meet.

Recommended as superior drama, as per usual from Merchant-Ivory productions, even without Merchant. – [DVD] [Blu-Ray]

Drama

Rated PG-13

DVD Release Date: 8/17/10

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